The "planetary alignment" in February & March 2026

As we get towards the end of February you are going to see lots of people and news outlets talking about what’s been dubbed a “planet parade” or “planetary alignment” where 6 planets are visible at once in the sky: Mercury, Venus, Saturn, and Jupiter with the naked eye, and Uranus and Neptune with a telescope. That’s true of the rest of February and into early March (although it will get harder and harder to spot Mercury as we get into March as it gets closer to the Sun), so this is not just visible on one night. I’ve seen a lot of media outlets covering this already stating this planetary parade will be on the 28th February specifically, which is honestly bizzare, I don’t know where that date has come from! The only thing I can think is that the 28th is a good balance between Venus rising earlier each night and Mercury setting each night, so you’ve got a good chance of actually spotting both. Now just to do some quick fire FAQs on this: the parade or alignment name comes from the fact that yes they’re all in a line on the sky, that’s because the Solar System is a flat plane, but that doesn’t mean they’re all lined up in space. It just means that they’re all over on the same side of the Sun as Earth in their orbits, it’s only Mars that’s still the other side of the Sun from Earth so we can’t see it. This also isn’t that rare, the last time this happened was February 2025 and before that back in 2022. So if you have a clear night around the end of February, you can enjoy the planet parade, but be aware, unless you have a very clear horizon in the west to look just after sunset to spot Merucry, Venus and Saturn, the only planet you’ll see with just your eyes later in the night will be the very bright Jupiter which will be in our skies for a few months yet. #astronomy #stargazing #planets #planetparade #planetalignment #planetaryalignment 👩🏽‍💻 I'm Dr. Becky Smethurst, an astrophysicist at the University of Oxford (Christ Church). I love making videos about science with an unnatural level of enthusiasm. I like to focus on how we know things, not just what we know. And especially, the things we still don't know. If you've ever wondered about something in space and couldn't find an answer online - you can ask me! My day job is to do research into how supermassive black holes can affect the galaxies that they live in. In particular, I look at whether the energy output from the disk of material orbiting around a growing supermassive black hole can stop a galaxy from forming stars. http://drbecky.uk.com