{"id":49662,"date":"2023-09-19T08:46:48","date_gmt":"2023-09-19T08:46:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/e2814441-0884-4fd2-992e-db93deed15f5"},"modified":"2023-09-19T09:32:32","modified_gmt":"2023-09-19T09:32:32","slug":"which-planet-has-the-most-moons","status":"publish","type":"rss_feed","link":"https:\/\/c01.purpledshub.com\/bbcskyatnight\/rss_feed\/which-planet-has-the-most-moons\/","title":{"rendered":"Which planet has the most moons?"},"content":{"rendered":"

A guide to the number of moons in the Solar System, and which planet is currently king of the moons. <\/p>

By Iain Todd\n <\/p>

Published: Tuesday, 19 September 2023 at 08:46 AM<\/p>

\n\n

There are 8 planets in our Solar System, including Earth, some with many moons, some with a few, and some with none.<\/p>

So which planet has the most moons? Are moons ubiquitous across our Solar System?<\/p>

And when you think about it, can a moon have a moon<\/a>?<\/p>

As with all questions relating to planets, the answer to that depends on whether you\u2019re talking about planets within our own Solar System<\/a>, or about planets in the Universe as a whole.<\/p>

It also depends on how you define a moon.<\/p>

An illustration showing Jupiter and its four Galilean moons, from left to right Io, Europa, Ganymede, Callisto.Credit: NASA\/JPL\/DLR<\/figcaption><\/figure>
**What makes a moon a moon?<\/strong><\/h2>**Per NASA\u2019s Solar System website<\/a> there are two kinds of moon:<\/p>
‘Traditional\u2019 moons<\/li>
\u2018Small body\u2019 moons<\/li><\/ul>
Traditional moons are the kind of moons you\u2019re probably thinking of: objects that, like our own Moon, are relatively large compared to their host planet, and orbit it at not too great a distance.<\/p>
Small body moons include bodies such as asteroids<\/a> and Kuiper Belt<\/a> Objects.<\/p>
Some of these also orbit planets (rather than orbiting the Sun), but they\u2019re of much smaller relative size and their orbital distances are much greater.<\/p>
$\"Phobos$
Phobos orbiting Mars, as seen by the Hubble Space Telescope. Credit: NASA, ESA, and Z. Levay (STScI)<\/figcaption><\/figure>
Moons across the Solar System<\/strong><\/h2>
In terms of traditional moons, Venus and Mercury don\u2019t have any.<\/p>
Earth has one moon and Mars has two moons, known as Phobos and Deimos<\/a>.<\/p>
But it\u2019s the gas giants that have the most moons.<\/p>
Jupiter boasts 95 moons but Saturn has more moons than Jupiter, with a staggering 146 confirmed so far.<\/p>
So which planet has the most moons? The answer is Saturn.<\/p>
You might even say Saturn is the king of the moons in our Solar System, as it has more moons than any other planet.<\/p>
$\"Moon$
Moon Titan appears in front of Saturn in an image captured by NASA\u2019s Cassini spacecraft. Credit:\u00a0NASA\/JPL-Caltech\/Space Science Institute<\/figcaption><\/figure>
As we head towards the outer planets of the Solar System, we find fewer moons.<\/p>
Uranus has 27 moons, Neptune has 14 moons and even dwarf planet Pluto can proudly claim 5 moons.<\/p>
That makes a total of 290 traditional moons within the Solar System.<\/p>
But factor in small body moons, and the Solar System has a \u201ctotal reported moon count\u201d, according to NASA, of 752.<\/p>
$\"Hubble$
Hubble discovered three moons around dwarf planet Pluto. Credit: NASA, ESA, H. Weaver (JHU\/APL), A. Stern (SwRI), and the HST Pluto Companion Search Team<\/figcaption><\/figure>
Exoplanets and exomoons<\/strong><\/h2>
When it comes to exoplanets, it\u2019s harder to give a definitive answer.<\/p>
Exoplanets are so far away that it\u2019s hard to detect the planets themselves, let alone any smaller bodies that are circling them!<\/p>
In fact, astronomers have yet to categorically identify any exomoons at all.<\/p>
$\"Exomoons$
This artist\u2019s illustration shows a moon in orbit around a gas giant exoplanet.NASA GSFC: Jay Friedlander and Britt Griswold<\/figcaption><\/figure>
However, observations of some \u2018hot Jupiter\u2019-type exoplanets suggest that they may well have moons: these include Kepler-1625b, Kepler-1708b and Kepler-1513b.<\/p>
While we have no direct evidence yet, there is no obvious scientific reason why exoplanets shouldn\u2019t have moons \u2013 indeed, logically, they should.<\/p>
And given that they can be many, many times larger than Jupiter or Saturn, there\u2019s no reason they shouldn\u2019t, accordingly, have an even larger cohort of natural satellites.<\/p> <\/body><\/html>\n
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