main-belt asteroid
Vesta
One of the largest asteroids, a layered protoplanet with a giant south-pole impact basin, mapped in detail by NASA's Dawn.
- Distance from Earth today
- 232.8 million km1.556 AU · light: 12 min 57 s
- Distance from the Sun today
- 371.6 million km2.484 AU
- As of
- 2 November 2026position from NASA/JPL orbital elements
Where it is today
Top view of the plane of Earth’s orbit, compressed distance scale. Open on the big map with the time slider →
Facts
- Diameter
- 523 km
- Dimensions
- 569.24 × 554.48 × 452.66 km
- Mass
- 259 × 10¹⁸ kg
- Density
- 3,460 kg/m³
- Rotation period
- 5.3 h
- Semi-major axis
- 2.361 AU (353.2 million km)
- Perihelion
- 2.148 AU
- Aphelion
- 2.574 AU
- Orbital period
- 3.63 years
- Orbital eccentricity
- 0.090
- Orbital inclination
- 7.1°
- Last perihelion
- 13 August 2025
- Next perihelion
- 31 March 2029
- Minimum orbit distance from Earth’s orbit (MOID)
- 1.136 AU (169.9 million km)
- Albedo
- 0.423
Source of the figures: JPL Small-Body Database (public domain).
Discovery: 1807 – Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers
Description
Vesta, discovered by Heinrich Olbers in 1807, is one of the most massive bodies in the asteroid belt and the brightest asteroid seen from Earth, occasionally just visible to the naked eye. It is a surviving protoplanet that once melted and separated into an iron core, a rocky mantle and a basaltic crust. A colossal impact near its south pole left the Rheasilvia basin, whose central peak is one of the tallest mountains in the Solar System; debris from such impacts reaches Earth as the HED meteorites. NASA's Dawn orbited Vesta in 2011–2012 before moving on to Ceres.