Reddish-brown icy dwarf planet in the Kuiper Belt.
Dwarf planet: Round, but shares its orbit with other rubble. Every kind of thing there is →
No. No telescope on Earth will show you this one; it is here to be understood, not seen. It is here because it is worth knowing about — and because leaving it out would make the sky look emptier than it is.
Makemake is about 1/8 of Earth. In weight, about 1/1,900th of Earth. Sunlight takes 6.3 hours to reach Makemake — on average, because that distance changes as it goes round. Its year: ~305 Earth years. Its day: ~22.5 hours.
| Across | 1 430 km |
|---|---|
| Distance from the Sun, on average | ~46 AU · sunlight takes 6.3 hours |
| Once round its orbit | 306.2 Earth years |
| One day there | 22.8 hours |
Nobody flew a tape measure out there. Every number on this page was worked out from the ground:
Not this one. But the sky over your head is full of ones you can see, and the Planetarium knows which.