What if we told you that people haven’t seen a real appulse for years… We have never seen one! But occasionally, you can come across news about another parade of planets. This phenomenon is most often understood as the ability to observe several planets simultaneously.
Seeing all seven planets in one evening is an attractive prospect for anyone who cares about the starry sky. And such an opportunity will potentially arise at the end of February this year. The media call such configurations an “parade of planets” or “planetary alignment”. But how many can be seen with the naked eye, and what is needed to see them all? And what is meant by an appulse, and when did this concept come into use? Let’s find out!
What is the “parade of planets” and when did this concept appear?
There is a rather interesting story behind this. We are most likely indebted to John Gribbin and Stephen Plagemann, who in 1974 published the book “The Jupiter Effect”. The authors focused on the date of March 10, 1982, when all the planets were supposed to be on the same side of the Sun, within a sector of 95°.
The authors predicted that several disasters would occur on Earth in connection with this phenomenon, including a major earthquake in the San Andreas Fault area (California, USA) at the boundary of the Pacific and North American plates. It is quite obvious that the tidal interaction of the planets at such distances is vanishingly small. But the authors tried to “get around” this issue, insisting that such a configuration would affect the solar wind, causing variations in the weather on Earth, which would change the speed of its rotation, and this, in turn, would lead to catastrophic consequences.
It is not surprising that with such content, The Jupiter Effect quickly became a bestseller – books were selling like hotcakes. The configuration of the planets on the date in question attracted the attention of the general public. Some people were watching the planets, some took the statement seriously and expected the end of the world, and some were throwing a noisy party that day.
But March 10, 1982, came and went, and no disasters occurred. By that time, in February, John Gribbin had already renounced his theory, telling the New York Times that his key assumption about the increase in solar activity had not been borne out. Nevertheless, in April 1982, another (no less popular) book by Gribbin and Plagemann, The Jupiter Effect Reconsidered, was published. In it, they insisted that the expected effect did occur, but in 1980, it manifested itself in the eruption of Mount St. Helens (Washington State, USA), one of the most powerful in the twentieth century.
Today, the term “parade of planets” is not an astronomical term; it is never used among professionals but serves solely to popularize the science of the Universe. In this regard, this concept has no formal definition. But it is most often understood as a configuration in which several planets are close enough in the sky to be seen simultaneously.
In most cases, such as now, the planets are located in a fairly large sector of the sky. As of February 18, 2025, the angular distance from the westernmost planet (Mercury) to the easternmost planet (Mars) is almost 130°, and by February 24, it will have decreased slightly to 118°. After that, Saturn will become the westernmost planet, and the planets will occupy a sector of 116° in the sky, which will remain until the Lord of the Rings completely melts in the sunlight.
What exactly awaits us, and when?
For some reason, various sources indicate February 28 as the date of the “parade of planets” or “alignment of the planets”. It should be understood that the planets move across the sky rather slowly, so if they are visible on a certain date, they are almost certainly visible a few days before and at least a few days after it. And in fact, February 28 is not the best choice at all.
Since the beginning of this year, we have been able to see six planets simultaneously in the evenings – all except Mercury. They are scattered across the sky in a wide arc. Now, the fastest planet has circled the Sun and, in a few days, will begin to appear low in the west shortly after our daytime luminary sets. It is impossible to specify the exact date since the ability to see Mercury depends on many factors, including geographic location and atmospheric conditions, but you can be guided approximately by February 22-24 if the western horizon is fully open at the place of observation.
At the same time, Saturn, which can also still be seen in the evening in the west, is slowly approaching the Sun. It is becoming increasingly difficult to observe, but it is still possible. Thus, during the last days of February, all seven planets will indeed be in the sky at the same time.
Of course, now it is easier to see the brightest ones: Venus, Mars, and Jupiter. Saturn attracts much less attention because it is low above the horizon, with a magnitude of only +1.1m, and can only be distinguished from the stars by sky experts. Mercury will be even harder to spot: it can be found even lower in the sky shortly after sunset. Neptune, although formally higher above the horizon on these days, will be a rather difficult object to spot. Uranus, on the other hand, is much easier to see.
In general, since Mercury and Venus are inner planets relative to the Earth and never move far from the Sun, they can be observed either in the evening or at the end of the night, and never at midnight. Therefore, whenever the “parade of planets” includes these planets, observations should be made at this time.
A close approach of bright planets awaits earthlings on September 8, 2040, when all five naked-eye planets, with the new Moon in the mix, will fit into a circle with a radius of only 5°. However, the observation conditions will be very unfortunate.
Lined up in the sky – lined up in space?
All planets in the Solar System move in almost the same plane, deviating no more than 7° from the plane of the Earth’s orbit. This means that if we see several planets in the sky, they will necessarily stretch along the same arc, which is part of the ecliptic. Therefore, we should not regard the “alignment of the planets” as some kind of exotic rare event.
Almost every year, there is a season during which we see several “wandering stars” in the sky. In particular, in June 2022, before dawn, all seven planets were in the sky at the same time, and the same was observed at the end of the same year, but in the evening sky and a different configuration.
However, although the planets appear to be relatively close to each other when viewed from Earth, this does not mean that they are close in space. In the two diagrams below, you can see how widely the planets are scattered across the Solar System. The diagrams were drawn on the day the article was published, February 18, 2025, but there will be no dramatic changes over the next few days.
When people hear the phrase “parade of planets”, they often imagine that the planets are lined up in a strict line. In practice, this rarely happens. And most importantly, humanity has never seen anything like it.
Because of the specific spatial arrangement of the planets’ orbits, as well as their periods and precession, all the planets in the Solar System cannot line up strictly along the same line. But even if we assume that at some point, there was a “real parade of planets” and they were very close to this configuration, the next such arrangement will have to wait hundreds of millions of years!
To get a sense of how rare this phenomenon is, let’s take just three planets in the Solar System with the shortest rotation periods: Mercury, Venus, and Earth. The last true alignment of these three planets occurred in 373173 B.C., and the next two are expected in 69163 and 224504. Imagine how rare such an alignment would be if we gradually added all the other planets! And we won’t even be able to see them at the same time: Venus and Mercury will be on one side of the Earth and will be visible only as black silhouettes against the Sun, while all the other planets will be very close to each other and will be visible only in the night sky.
When to observe to see as many planets as possible?
If you want to see as many planets as possible in one evening, you shouldn’t put off this idea. As of today (February 18, 2025), you can easily see Venus, Jupiter, and Mars – they are visible to the naked eye even in a big city. It will be much more difficult to catch Saturn because after sunset, it is already quite low above the horizon, and the visibility of this planet is deteriorating every day. Therefore, the first necessary prerequisite for success is an open sunset.
Try to plan your observations so that the Sun is about 8° below the horizon (you can do this for your location using a virtual planetarium) and Saturn is about 8° above the horizon. This will be around 4:00 p.m. GMT (11:00 a.m. EST). Since the sky is still quite bright at that time, you will probably need binoculars and a telescope to see the planet’s shape.
The most distant planet, Neptune, will also be difficult to spot. In addition to being a faint object that cannot be seen with the naked eye, it will also be quite low above the horizon, so you will be hampered by both the relatively bright sky and a thick layer of atmosphere. A telescope will come in handy in this case.
Uranus, on the other hand, can be viewed slowly, as it will be a fairly comfortable time for observing until about 8:00 p.m. GMT (3 p.m. EST). In addition to being noticeably brighter than Neptune, Uranus can be found in darker skies and will be visible for quite some time after the start of the astronomical night.
Pay attention to the configuration on March 1. The Moon’s thin (4%) crescent will be located near Venus, Mercury, and Neptune. The approximate optimal time for observations is 4:15 p.m. GMT (11:15 a.m. EST), but to be more sure, it is better to use a planetarium to model the optimal time for your geographical location.
To summarize, we can say the following: to see as many planets as possible in one evening, observe right now or in the next couple of days! In this case, you will potentially have access to six planets (all except Mercury). On February 24-25, you can start “hunting” for Mercury. But it will be successful only if the horizon is open and the atmosphere is clear and stable. If you can catch the planet closest to the Sun on these days, it will help you find Saturn, as the distance between them will be about 2°. A successful configuration awaits us on March 1: observations of Mercury will become more comfortable but, at the same time, “lost” Saturn, which by then will be too close to the Sun.
And finally, yes, technically, in the last days of February and the first days of March, all seven planets will indeed be in the evening sky. But it is almost impossible to see them all in one evening.
