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Far from any lights, the sky fills with stars. Drawn from real star positions; bigger dots are brighter stars. See it from a city or the suburbs in the app.

✨ Constellation

Cancer

The Crab: the faintest constellation of the zodiac, with a star cluster at its heart.

Name means: The Crab
Best seen: March evenings
Where to see it: Almost everywhere on Earth
Brightest star: Tarf
Stars in the pattern: 5

Did you know?

In its middle is the Beehive Cluster, a swarm of stars that looks like a misty patch from a dark place.
The Tropic of Cancer is named after it: about 2,000 years ago the Sun was in Cancer at the June solstice.

In this part of the sky

Gemini The Twins, Castor and Pollux, side by side. Leo The Lion, whose head is a backwards question mark of stars.

More NASA photos of CancerStraight from NASA’s image library, in the app

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All of night sky

Orion The Hunter, with three bright stars in a row for his belt. Ursa Major The Great Bear, home of the Big Dipper. Ursa Minor The Little Bear, with Polaris at the tip of its tail. Cassiopeia A bright W of five stars, named after a boastful queen. Scorpius The Scorpion, with red Antares at its heart. Leo The Lion, whose head is a backwards question mark of stars.

Facts: Star patterns: d3-celestial (IAU figures, Hipparcos star data). Stories: traditional Greek and Roman myths. Open Cancer in the app.