Science & history · Constellation guide
Scorpius, the scorpion
Scorpius really looks like its namesake: a curving line of stars ending in a raised sting, with red Antares at the heart. It lies on the Sun's yearly path, low in the south for northern observers and high overhead for southern ones.
About this picture
NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio. Gaia DR2: ESA/Gaia/DPAC. Constellation figures based on those developed for the IAU by Alan MacRobert of Sky and Telescope magazine (Roger Sinnott and Rick Fienberg). NASA's page (opens in a new tab).
The map is a composite of 1.7 billion catalogued stars, not a photograph from one place: it shows stars far too faint for the eye, and no weather, Moon or city light. It is drawn here in this chart's projection, with each star where it was in 2000; the fastest-moving bright star has shifted about a minute of arc since, far less than a pixel here.
How to spot it: A long curving line of stars with red Antares at its heart. Source (opens in a new tab)
What you are looking at
A curving line of stars with a red heart: one of the few constellations that looks like its name.
Ridpath (opens in a new tab) describes the scorpion with the red star Antares in the middle of its body and part of the body overlapped by the foot of Ophiuchus, the serpent-bearer, to the north. Scorpius is the 33rd constellation by size.
The name of its heart star is Greek for “like Mars”, for its colour; the Antares guide covers the star itself. Scorpius (opens in a new tab) is the astronomers' name; Scorpio, the old name, is now used only by astrologers.
Sources for this section Ian Ridpath, Star Tales: Scorpius (opens in a new tab)
A scorpion that lost its claws
The Greek scorpion was twice as big: its claws became Libra.
The Greek scorpion was much larger than today's (opens in a new tab). Its back half, Skorpios, held the body and sting; the front half was the claws, Chelae. In the first century BC the Romans made the claws a separate constellation, Libra, the balance.
The figure is far older than the Greeks: the Sumerians knew it (opens in a new tab) as GIR-TAB, the scorpion, more than 5,000 years ago.
Sources for this section Ian Ridpath, Star Tales: Scorpius (opens in a new tab)
How to find it
Low in the south for mid-northern observers, high overhead for southern ones.
By this site's calculation (opens in a new tab), the scorpion's middle reaches only about 17° up in the south from 40°N but almost overhead from 35°S, and it is highest at about 9 p.m. local time in mid-July. From far north the tail never clears the horizon; the computed block gives the latitudes.
Orion and the scorpion are on opposite sides of the sky (opens in a new tab), so that as Orion sets the scorpion rises, which Ridpath suggests may be where the Greek story began. The story is in Historical beliefs.
How to see it For northern observers, the Night Sky Network (opens in a new tab) notes that the brightest part of the Milky Way rises in the south-east marked by Scorpius and Sagittarius; look for the red star with a curve of stars below it, then the Teapot to its east.
Sources for this section Bright Star Catalogue, 5th Revised Ed. (Hoffleit & Warren 1991), as computed by this site's star engine (opens in a new tab); Ian Ridpath, Star Tales: Scorpius (opens in a new tab); Kat Troche (Astronomical Society of the Pacific), The Great Rift, NASA Night Sky Network (2025) (opens in a new tab)
What you can actually see
Red Antares, a hook of bright stars, and a globular cluster beside the heart for a small telescope.
Antares shows a strong red tint (opens in a new tab) to the unaided eye. Beside it is Messier 4 (opens in a new tab), the closest globular cluster to Earth at about 5,500 light-years, magnitude 5.9 and relatively easy to find with a small telescope as a soft glow.
Scorpius is one of two constellations on the Night Sky Network's Dark Sky Wheel (opens in a new tab), Orion being the other: comparing the stars you can see with the chart when it is high gives your sky's limiting magnitude.
Sources for this section ESO, Best Ever Image of a Star's Surface and Atmosphere (eso1726, 2017) (opens in a new tab); NASA Hubble, Messier 4 (opens in a new tab); Kat Troche (Astronomical Society of the Pacific), Check Your Sky Quality with Orion!, NASA Night Sky Network (2023) (opens in a new tab)
On the Sun's path
The Sun passes through Scorpius each year, and through Ophiuchus next door.
The Sun's yearly path crosses Scorpius and also neighbouring Ophiuchus. The IAU (opens in a new tab) counts Ophiuchus among the constellations of the zodiac in the astronomical sense, and points out that constellations differ in size, so the Sun spends different lengths of time in each.
None of that changes anyone's astrological sign, as NASA has said (opens in a new tab): a sign is a 30° section of a symbolic zodiac rather than a constellation. The zodiac and Ophiuchus explains the difference, and Astrology & myths covers the signs on their own terms.
Sources for this section International Astronomical Union, Astronomy FAQs (opens in a new tab); NASA, Constellations and the Calendar (2016) (opens in a new tab)
Where on Earth, and when
The whole key pattern rises from anywhere south of about 47°N.
North of about 67°N, none of it rises.
South of about 67°S, the whole key pattern never sets.
Its middle climbs at least 20° high, the finder's threshold for a suggestion, from anywhere south of about 37°N.
It is highest in the evening sky, at about 9 p.m. local time, in mid-July, from either hemisphere, wherever it rises. With daylight saving time, that is nearer 10 p.m. on the clock.
Worked out by this site from the Bright Star Catalogue, for a flat, clear horizon. Hills, buildings, haze and city light all cut into this; the air also lifts objects near the horizon by about half a degree. For your own place and night, use the sky finder.
Sources
- History Ian Ridpath, Star Tales: Scorpius (opens in a new tab) for the figure, the claws, the names, its age and its place opposite Orion · checked 27 September 2026
- Astronomy Kat Troche (Astronomical Society of the Pacific), The Great Rift, NASA Night Sky Network (2025) (opens in a new tab) for the Milky Way rising with Scorpius · checked 27 September 2026
- Astronomy ESO, Best Ever Image of a Star's Surface and Atmosphere (eso1726, 2017) (opens in a new tab) for Antares's colour · checked 27 September 2026
- Astronomy NASA Hubble, Messier 4 (opens in a new tab) for Messier 4 · checked 27 September 2026
- Astronomy Kat Troche (Astronomical Society of the Pacific), Check Your Sky Quality with Orion!, NASA Night Sky Network (2023) (opens in a new tab) for the Dark Sky Wheel · checked 27 September 2026
- Astronomy International Astronomical Union, Astronomy FAQs (opens in a new tab) for Ophiuchus and the zodiac in astronomy · checked 27 September 2026
- Astronomy Bright Star Catalogue, 5th Revised Ed. (Hoffleit & Warren 1991), as computed by this site's star engine (opens in a new tab) for its height from 40°N and 35°S, and best month
