How long is Saturn's orbit?

Saturn takes 29.46 years to go once round the Sun. It is travelling at 9.75 km/s at the moment — a speed that changes through the orbit, fastest at perihelion and slowest at aphelion.

What shape is Saturn's orbit?

An ellipse with the Sun at one focus, not at the centre. Its eccentricity is 0.0541, derived here from the perihelion and aphelion distances rather than quoted: 9.015 AU at closest and 10.05 AU at furthest, a difference of 154,350,588 km.

Where is Saturn in its orbit now?

9.432 AU from the Sun — 1.41 billion km — which is 40% of the way from its closest point to its furthest. It next reaches perihelion on 28 November 2032.

Saturn

Saturn's orbit

Once round the Sun every 29.46 years, on an ellipse drawn here from the ephemeris rather than from a formula.

Looking down on the plane of the ecliptic, traced from the ephemeris over one full orbit of 29.5 years. Jupiter’s orbit is the faint one, for scale. The Sun sits off the centre of the ellipse — that offset is the eccentricity, and it is why the two distances differ.

Orbital period: 29.46; years for one lap
Eccentricity: 0.0541; 0 would be a circle
Semi-major axis: 9.531; AU · the orbit's average radius
Speed now: 9.75; km/s, from the ephemeris

What is worth knowing about it

Saturn takes about twenty-nine and a half years to orbit the Sun, so a single Saturnian year spans most of a human working life. Its ring plane tilts through our line of sight twice per orbit, which is why the rings sometimes vanish from view.

The shape of it

Saturn does not travel a circle. It comes as close as 9.015 AU (1.35 billion km) and goes as far as 10.05 AU (1.50 billion km) — aphelion is 1.11 times further out than perihelion, a swing of 154,350,588 km. At 0.0541 the orbit is close to circular. The difference is real and measurable, but not something the eye would pick out of a drawing.

Because the Sun sits at a focus rather than the centre, Saturn does not move at a constant speed either. It runs fastest when it is closest and slowest when it is furthest, sweeping equal areas in equal times — which is Kepler's second law, and is visible in the diagram above as the uneven spacing of a constant time step.

Where it is now

Today Saturn is 9.432 AU from the Sun, 40% of the way from perihelion to aphelion, travelling at 9.75 km/s. It reaches perihelion on 28 November 2032 at 9.015 AU.

Common questions

How long is Saturn's orbit?: Saturn takes 29.46 years to go once round the Sun. It is travelling at 9.75 km/s at the moment — a speed that changes through the orbit, fastest at perihelion and slowest at aphelion.
What shape is Saturn's orbit?: An ellipse with the Sun at one focus, not at the centre. Its eccentricity is 0.0541, derived here from the perihelion and aphelion distances rather than quoted: 9.015 AU at closest and 10.05 AU at furthest, a difference of 154,350,588 km.
Where is Saturn in its orbit now?: 9.432 AU from the Sun — 1.41 billion km — which is 40% of the way from its closest point to its furthest. It next reaches perihelion on 28 November 2032.

Positions from VSOP87 via Astronomy Engine, accurate to within one arcminute. The orbit above is traced by sampling a full period rather than drawn from elements, so the tilt and the off-centre Sun are the real ones. See Saturn’s distance from the Sun, Saturn right now, or watch the whole system move in the live simulation.