# Nihal (Beta Leporis)

Nihal (Beta Leporis) is a star in the constellation Lepus, magnitude 2.8.

**A yellow bright giant in the Hare, whose Arabic name means “quenching their thirst”.**

Nihal has lived fast. With 3.5 times the Sun’s mass, it needed only about 240 million years to burn through the hydrogen in its core. It has since swollen into a [yellow](https://astropilot.space/glossary/star-colour) bright giant nearly 16 times the Sun’s width.

It has a fainter companion that may be in orbit around it. Astronomers measured the pair with adaptive optics on the AEOS telescope at Haleakala in Hawaii, and the companion itself seems to change in brightness: it is listed as a suspected variable star.

The name is Arabic for “quenching their thirst”. Chinese astronomers, less poetically, made it the second star of Cè, the Toilet — Arneb is the first.

Nihal (Beta Leporis) is 160 light-years away: the light we see from it set off around 1865, 13 years before Edison lit his first practical light bulb — the start of light pollution.

## Did you know?

- **Measuring a giant.** Nihal’s disc spans just 3 thousandths of an arcsecond, yet astronomers have measured it — and from that worked out its true width.
- **Nibal by mistake.** The occasional spelling Nibal seems to come from nothing more than a misreading of Nihal.

A pale yellow star of magnitude 2.8 in Lepus, about 3 degrees south-south-west of Arneb, the Hare’s brightest star. Its 7th-magnitude companion lies just 2.6 arcseconds due north — a tough test needing a steady night and high power.

## When and where to see it

It is best placed in the evening sky around January, when it crosses the meridian at about 10 pm local time (around midnight in December). It can be seen from everywhere south of 69°N and never sets south of 69°S.

At its highest it stands 19° up from 50°N, 34° up from 35°N, 69° up from the equator, 76° up from 35°S.

## Facts

- Type: Star
- Constellation: Lepus
- Designations: Beta Leporis, β Lep, 9 Lep, HR 1829, HD 36079, HIP 25606
- Magnitude: 2.8
- Position: RA 5h 28.2m, Dec −20° 46′ (J2000)
- Spectral type: G5II-IIIa:
- Colour: yellow (B−V 0.82)
- Distance: 160 light-years
- Discovered: Known since antiquity

Open AstroPilot to see when Nihal (Beta Leporis) is highest tonight from your location, how easy it is with your telescope or binoculars, and an eyepiece view. https://astropilot.space/object/nihal