Your Eyes In Space Open the simulation

Exoplanet · super-Earth

Kepler-221 b

Kepler-221 b is a super-Earth orbiting the star Kepler-221. Its year lasts 2.8 Earth days. It was discovered in 2014 by the Transit method.

Host starKepler-221
Distance1,256 light-years (385.2 pc)
Orbital period2.8 days
Orbital radius0.037 AU
Eccentricity0.000
Radius1.71 R⊕ · 0.153 R♃
Mass5.96 M⊕ · 0.0187 M♃
Density0.19 g/cm³
Surface gravity2.04 × Earth
Equilibrium temperature1,090 K (817 °C)
Stellar flux received309 × Earth
Discovery methodTransit
Discovery year2014
Discovered byKepler

Habitable zone

Inside the inner edge of the habitable zone: it receives 309 times the light the Earth does, too hot to keep liquid water on its surface.

Its star in the sky

In the planet's sky its star is a disc 12° across: 22 times the Sun as we see it from Earth.

In the sky

A telescope is needed to see it: its apparent magnitude is 13.97. Visible from the whole Northern Hemisphere and south to latitude 43° S. North of latitude 43° N it never sets. It stands highest at midnight in July, the best time to observe it.

Light's journey

The light you see tonight set out around the year 770. At the speed of Voyager 1, the fastest craft leaving the Solar System (16.9 km per second), the trip would take 22 million years.

Planets in the same system

Open in the simulation

Data: NASA Exoplanet Archive, PSCompPars. Its look in the simulation is a rendering based on the measured radius, mass and temperature.