Rigel

stars · Orion · blue supergiant · space

Blue giant star. Rigel is a blue supergiant, which means it's much hotter and brighter than our sun. The intense heat makes it glow with a brilliant blue-white color that you can see from Earth on clear nights.

Part of Orion. You can find Rigel in the constellation Orion the Hunter, one of the brightest and most famous star patterns in the night sky. It marks the hunter's left foot (or right foot from our view).

A star system. Rigel looks like a single point of light when you gaze at it, but it's actually a system of at least four stars orbiting together in space. The largest blue supergiant is the brightest and most massive one.

Incredibly distant. Rigel is about 850 light-years away from Earth, which means the light we see from it today actually left that star 850 years ago. That's almost 8 million billion kilometers away!

Super massive star. Rigel is one of the most massive stars we know about, much heavier than our sun. Its enormous size and heat make it burn through its fuel very quickly compared to other stars.