The 36 brightest quasars, brightest first
Sort any column, or type a name or constellation; the buttons above the map filter by distance. Redshift is how much the light is stretched by the expansion of the universe; the distance is how far the light has traveled to reach us. This list keeps only true quasars; Seyfert galaxies, whose nuclei are fainter than their host galaxies, are left out.
| Quasar | Also | Constellation | Mag | Redshift | Light-travel distance ly | Best |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3C 273 | PG 1226+023, HIP 60936 | Virgo | 12.85 | 0.158 | 2.0 billion | May |
| HE 1029-1401 | Hydra | 13.86 | 0.086 | 1.1 billion | Apr | |
| PHL 1811 | Capricornus | 13.90 | 0.192 | 2.4 billion | Oct | |
| I Zw 1 | UGC 545, Mrk 1502 | Pisces | 14.03 | 0.061 | 820 million | Nov |
| PDS 456 | Serpens | 14.03 | 0.184 | 2.3 billion | Jul | |
| PG 1211+143 | PGC 39086 | Coma Berenices | 14.19 | 0.082 | 1.1 billion | May |
| H 1821+643 | KUV 18217+6419, E 1821+643 | Draco | 14.24 | 0.297 | 3.4 billion | Aug |
| PG 1351+640 | Draco | 14.28 | 0.087 | 1.1 billion | Jun | |
| MR 2251-178 | PGC 70161 | Aquarius | 14.36 | 0.064 | 850 million | Oct |
| B3 0754+395 | 1E 0754+394 | Lynx | 14.36 | 0.096 | 1.2 billion | Mar |
| Ton 599 | 4C +29.45, 4FGL J1159.5+2914 | Ursa Major | 14.41 | 0.725 | 6.4 billion | May |
| HS 0624+6907 | Camelopardalis | 14.44 | 0.370 | 4.0 billion | Feb | |
| IRAS 21219-1757 | Capricornus | 14.50 | 0.113 | 1.5 billion | Sep | |
| Ton 951 | PG 0844+349 | Lynx | 14.50 | 0.064 | 850 million | Mar |
| Mrk 478 | PG 1440+356 | Boötes | 14.58 | 0.077 | 1.0 billion | Jun |
| PG 1718+481 | Hercules | 14.60 | 1.083 | 8.0 billion | Jul | |
| VII Zw 118 | 7Zw 118 | Camelopardalis | 14.61 | 0.079 | 1.0 billion | Feb |
| II Zw 136 | PG 2130+099, HB89 2130+099 | Pegasus | 14.64 | 0.061 | 820 million | Sep |
| PG 1634+706 | Draco | 14.66 | 1.337 | 8.8 billion | Jul | |
| Mrk 304 | PG 2214+139 | Pegasus | 14.66 | 0.067 | 890 million | Oct |
| 2E 2124-1459 | Capricornus | 14.68 | 0.057 | 760 million | Sep | |
| PG 0804+762 | Camelopardalis | 14.71 | 0.100 | 1.3 billion | Mar | |
| Ton 1388 | PG 1116+215 | Leo | 14.72 | 0.176 | 2.2 billion | Apr |
| PG 0026+129 | Pisces | 14.78 | 0.145 | 1.8 billion | Nov | |
| MS 0318.0-1937 | Eridanus | 14.86 | 0.104 | 1.4 billion | Dec | |
| PKS 0405-123 | OF -109, Ohio F-109 | Eridanus | 14.86 | 0.574 | 5.5 billion | Jan |
| Mrk 1383 | PG 1426+015 | Virgo | 14.87 | 0.086 | 1.1 billion | Jun |
| PG 1138+222 | PGC 36264 | Leo | 14.90 | 0.063 | 840 million | May |
| MS 1519.8-0633 | Libra | 14.90 | 0.084 | 1.1 billion | Jun | |
| PKS 0558-504 | Pictor | 14.97 | 0.137 | 1.7 billion | Feb | |
| PG 1411+442 | PB 1732 | Boötes | 14.99 | 0.089 | 1.2 billion | Jun |
| IRAS 13349+2438 | Boötes | 15.00 | 0.107 | 1.4 billion | Jun | |
| SBS 1116+518 | Ursa Major | 15.00 | Apr | |||
| Mrk 1320 | Virgo | 15.00 | 0.103 | 1.3 billion | May | |
| PG 1448+273 | Boötes | 15.01 | 0.064 | 850 million | Jun | |
| PG 1700+518 | Draco | 15.10 | 0.292 | 3.3 billion | Jul |
A quasar is a supermassive black hole swallowing gas, outshining its whole galaxy
Gas falling into a black hole of hundreds of millions to billions of solar masses forms a disk that heats until it glows brighter than all the stars of the galaxy around it, often by a factor of a hundred or more, from a region not much larger than the solar system. Through a telescope the result looks like a faint star; the name is short for quasi-stellar radio source, though most quasars are quiet in radio. Quasars were most common about 10 billion years ago; the ones on this page are the nearest and brightest of them.
3C 273 in Virgo, magnitude 12.8, is the brightest quasar in the sky
In 1963 Maarten Schmidt at Palomar recognized the lines in the spectrum of 3C 273 as hydrogen, shifted 16% toward the red. That redshift put it about 2.0 billion light-years away, so it had to be giving off trillions of times the Sun's light: the first quasar understood. A jet of gas 200,000 light-years long points away from it, visible in long exposures.
14 of these quasars are brighter than magnitude 14.5, within reach of an 8-inch telescope
A quasar looks like a dim star, so finding one takes a detailed chart. The reward is distance: 3C 273's light set out about 2.0 billion years ago, when the only life on Earth was single cells. The farthest here, PG 1634+706, is magnitude 14.7, and its light has traveled for about 8.8 billion years. 25 of the 36 are north of the celestial equator. Lacerta's BL Lacertae, a related kind of object called a blazar, looks like a variable star and is often mistaken for one.
From 760 million to 8.8 billion light-years
Each dot is one quasar, on a scale where each step is ten times farther.