{"id":665438,"date":"2026-05-26T05:27:16","date_gmt":"2026-05-26T05:27:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/665438\/"},"modified":"2026-05-26T05:27:16","modified_gmt":"2026-05-26T05:27:16","slug":"the-sky-today-on-monday-may-25-three-planets-after-sunset","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/665438\/","title":{"rendered":"The Sky Today on Monday, May 25: Three planets after sunset"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\t\t\tBack to Article List\t\t<\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\tA trio of planets stand in line in the evening sky after sunset: Jupiter, Venus, and Mercury, all visible in the twilit sky.\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"1369\" height=\"884\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/05\/Mercury-Venus-Jupiter.png\" class=\"attachment-large size-large wp-post-image\" alt=\"A sky chart showing the western sky on May 25, 2026, 30 minutes after sunset. Three planets are visible and labeled against a warm twilight gradient fading from deep gray-brown at the top to glowing orange near the horizon: Jupiter appears as a bright point in the upper left, Venus shines more brightly in the middle, and Mercury is a faint point low on the right side close to the horizon. A dark landscape silhouette runs along the bottom of the image.\"\/><\/p>\n<p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\tBy May 25, Mercury is readily visible in the evening sky for a short time after sunset, standing in line with fellow planets Venus and Jupiter. Credit: Stellarium\t\t\t\t\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">Looking for a sky event this week? Check out our full\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-this-week-from-may-22-to-29-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Sky This Week<\/a>\u00a0column.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"has-text-align-center wp-block-paragraph\">May 24: <a href=\"https:\/\/www.astronomy.com\/observing\/the-sky-today-sunday-may-24-2026\/\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Egeria slides on by<\/a><\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">After reaching superior conjunction midmonth, Mercury\u00a0is increasing in visibility and should be easily identifiable now in the evening sky. Just half an hour after sunset, step outside to see if you can spot the solar system\u2019s smallest world, now shining at a respectable magnitude \u20131.1. It should be 6\u00b0 above the western horizon.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">You will, of course, also spot brighter Venus and Jupiter. Jupiter is highest in the sky, now in eastern Gemini and shining at magnitude \u20131.9. Venus, a little lower, sits closer to the Twins\u2019 feet and lies between Jupiter and Mercury, shining at magnitude \u20133.9.\u00a0 If you have trouble spotting Mercury, simply draw a line from Jupiter down through Venus and continue it toward the horizon. Mercury lies along that line.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Through a telescope, compare the sizes and illuminated extents of Venus and Mercury. The former now appears some 13\u201d across, with 81 percent of its visible disk (cloud tops) lit. Mercury is a slightly more illuminated at 84 percent lit, but it\u2019s less than half the size of Venus, stretching only 6\u201d wide in our sky.\u00a0<\/p>\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Sunrise: 5:37 A.M.\u00a0<br \/>Sunset: 8:17 P.M.\u00a0<br \/>Moonrise: 3:05 P.M.\u00a0<br \/>Moonset: 2:30 A.M.<br \/>Moon Phase: Waxing gibbous (76%)<br \/>*Times for sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset are given in local time from 40\u00b0 N 90\u00b0 W. The Moon\u2019s illumination is given at 10 P.M. local time from the same location.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Back to Article List A trio of planets stand in line in the evening sky after sunset: Jupiter,&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":665439,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[70135,79,169673],"class_list":["post-665438","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-science","tag-observing","tag-science","tag-sky-tonight"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665438","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=665438"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/665438\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/665439"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=665438"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=665438"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=665438"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}