Looking at a full moon in the night sky, one cannot help but fall in love with the view and to want to watch the heavenly object from a closer distance. The same happens to me all the time.

All the planets and their moons in our solar system are so far away that unless you own a really powerful telescope, you cannot see them at all. And even with a telescope, one cannot fully enjoy the beauty that they have to offer.

That is why, I sometimes like to imagine what these planets would look like from Earth, if they were closer, much closer. Say, at the distance of our moon. I know, if they were actually that close, the gravitational forces involved would be fatal.

That’s why we can only simulate what they would look like based on the data we have about them like their radius and the distance from the Earth to the Moon (384,400 kms).

So, without further adieu, let’s take a look at how our night sky would look like if our moon was replaced by other planets in our solar system. These photos were screenshotted off of a video made by YouTube user Yeti Dynamics. I have included the video at the end of this post.

Moon

For reference, this is how much of the night sky the moon occupies.

Mars

Let’s start with Mars. Mars, the red planet, with a radius of 3,390 km, is twice as large as the moon and it would definitely be noticeable.

Venus

Venus, the hottest planet in the solar system, is about 3.5 times larger than the moon with a radius of 6052 km and so, it would look much larger than the moon. This is what it would look like:

Neptune

Neptune is a large planet at a radius of 24,622 km and is 14 times larger than the Moon. This is where we would truly be in awe of the size of a heavenly object in the night sky. I think one would be aware of the presence of such a large object in the sky at all times!

Uranus

Uranus is only slightly larger than Neptune at a radius of 25,362 km, so not much difference there, but it has 9 bright rings which would be the main differentiator.

Jupiter

Ok, now we are talking BIG! Really big. At a radius of 69,911 km, Jupiter is the largest planet in the solar system. It is 40 times larger than the Moon and it’s presence in the sky would be totally a marvel.

If it were in place of our Moon, to us, it would feel as if we were the Moon of Jupiter and not the other way around.

Saturn

I have saved the best for the last. Although it is smaller in size than Jupiter, at a radius of 58,232 km, the rings surrounding Saturn, give it a much larger appearance that can almost span across your entire front view of the sky! Saturn truly is one of nature’s best creations!

If you want to see the planets come to life in the night sky, watch this 2 minute video, made by YouTube user Yeti Dynamics. There is a little bit of a surprise moment at 1:23 in the video.