The Sky Today on Monday, August 31: Venus and Spica gather close

Bright planet Venus and stellar signpost Spica hang together in Virgo after sunset. They’ll remain close for the next few days. | Published: August 31, 2026 An hour after sunset, Venus and Spica sit close together low in the west. The pair will remain about the same distance apart over the next few days, as Venus moves east through the sky. Credit: Stellarium Looking for a sky event this week? Check out our full Sky This Week column. August 30: The Moon, Neptune, and Saturn In the evening sky, blazing Venus is less than 2° southwest of Spica, the brightest star in Virgo the Maiden. Over the course of the next two days, Venus will appear to slide to the upper left (east) in the sky relative to stationary Spica, remaining within roughly 2° of the star as it does so. The pair is easy to spot in the west as soon as the Sun goes down and the sky begins to grow dark. At magnitude –4.6, Venus will pop out first, roughly 12° above the horizon 20 minutes after sunset. Magnitude 1.0 Spica will take a bit more time to appear — use the chart above to note its position, and see how soon you can see it. You can also enjoy the pair through binoculars or a telescope. In the latter, Venus will show a 39%-lit disk that stretches some 30” in the sky, an impressive size. It’s currently some 0.55 astronomical unit from Earth, where 1 astronomical unit, or AU, is the average Earth-Sun distance of 93 million miles (150 million kilometers). Sunrise: 6:27 A.M.Sunset: 7:33 P.M.Moonrise: 9:02 P.M.Moonset: 10:09 A.M.Moon Phase: Waning gibbous (83%)*Times for sunrise, sunset, moonrise, and moonset are given in local time from 40° N 90° W. The Moon’s illumination is given at 10 P.M. local time from the same location. Alison Klesman is senior editor of Astronomy magazine. She holds a Ph.D. in astronomy and has studied a variety of topics, from minor planets to supermassive black holes.