If you glanced up at the sky Saturday night, you might have noticed something unusual: several bright “stars” forming a loose line across the sky. Those weren’t stars at all – they were planets, taking part in a rare celestial lineup often called a planetary alignment or planetary parade.
From our point of view on Earth, it can look like the planets are neatly arranged in a straight line. However, they’re not lined up in space like beads on a string. Each planet is following its own orbit around the sun. Every so often, several of those orbits bring the planets to the same side of the sun at roughly the same time. When that happens, they appear grouped in the same region of our sky, creating the illusion of a line.
This week’s show features six planets: Jupiter, Saturn, Venus, Neptune, Uranus and Mercury. Together, they create a planetary parade that’s eye-catching—but not always easy to see.
What You Could See With Just Your Eyes are Mercury, Venus, Saturn and Jupiter.
The other two planets in this parade—Neptune and Uranus—are much more challenging to see and you’ll need a telescope to spot them.
This alignment is considered large because there were 6 planets, if you missed this one you can catch mini to small alignments throughout 2026.