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Looking up at the clear blue sky in the UK this afternoon Venus can easily be seen, just above and slightly to the left of the Moon. This for some reason reminded me of a tiebreaker question in an ancient BBC quiz show "Ask The Family" which ran something like "You are stood on top of the Eiffel Tower on a clear day, what is the most distant thing you can see?". The given answer was "The Sun". Now excepting once in a millennium exceptions such as nova of various sorts I'm wondering whether Venus could be the answer. A quick google shows that currently this is not the case - the current separation of Earth and Venus is ~0.75 astronomical units.

But could it be the case that Venus is visible by somebody with reasonably typical sight when the Sun is above the horizon and the Earth-Venus separation is greater than 1 A.U.? Or will Venus always be too close in the sky to the Sun?

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  • $\begingroup$ I try to find Venus before sunset quite frequently, and generally succeed when the elongation from the Sun is large and the Sun is low on the horizon. If you've never done it before, use binoculars first (stand in the shade to avoid accidently looking at the Sun). Others have reported seeing Jupiter, but I've never pulled it off. $\endgroup$
    – Greg Miller
    Commented Jan 3 at 16:56
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    $\begingroup$ In broad daylight, it is very hard to observe Saturn but NASA claims it is visible during sunset hours. More here and here $\endgroup$
    – Nilay Ghosh
    Commented Jan 3 at 18:11
  • $\begingroup$ Thanks guys for all the answers, sounds like Jupiter is a reasonable target for an almost 60 year old with reasonable sight ... But I'm still interested in the answer to the question I actually asked - " But could it be the case that Venus is visible by somebody with reasonably typical sight when the Sun is above the horizon and the Earth-Venus separation is greater than 1 A.U.?" $\endgroup$
    – Ian Bush
    Commented 2 days ago
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    $\begingroup$ The question has three excellent answers. Closing the question now and preventing answer posts would do no good and probably some harm; voting to leave open. $\endgroup$
    – uhoh
    Commented yesterday
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    $\begingroup$ Google search - 'Great Comet' - odds are they can be seen when beyond the sun some of the time. $\endgroup$
    – Russell McMahon
    Commented 22 hours ago

3 Answers 3

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If you know exactly where to look, with extremely clear skies, good vision, and the right positioning, Jupiter's visible during the daytime, and is always further from Earth than Venus or the Sun.

Observing Jupiter doesn’t require waiting for complete darkness; it’s bright enough to be spotted during twilight. In fact, you can even catch a glimpse of Jupiter in broad daylight if you know where to look!

Ideal conditions for daytime viewing of Jupiter include a clear, haze-free sky. To the naked eye, the planet will appear as a bright pinprick of light, but a good pair of binoculars or a telescope will reveal it as a small, pale disk.

https://lowell.edu/jupiter-during-daylight-why-it-happens-and-how-to-view-it

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    $\begingroup$ Sirius is another possibility, depending on how much you want to stretch the definition of "daytime". See skyandtelescope.org/observing/how-to-see-sirius-in-the-daytime $\endgroup$
    – JohnHoltz
    Commented Jan 3 at 17:00
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    $\begingroup$ I was at an astronomy show where they had an 8 inch Celestron pointed at Jupiter at noon. It was clearly visible. $\endgroup$
    – Ross Millikan
    Commented Jan 4 at 3:11
  • $\begingroup$ I’ve heard this claim about Venus before (and talked to people who said they’ve managed themselves, but I have never been able to confirm it myself). But this is the first time I’ve heard the same thing about Jupiter. $\endgroup$
    – Euro Micelli
    Commented 2 days ago
  • $\begingroup$ @EuroMicelli I spotted Venus during daytime once. It took about several months of trying to find a day that the air was sufficiently clear (it presumably would be much easier in desert areas than the hazy and humid US northeast). The day I did it, it was reasonably close to the moon localizing the area I needed to search. I then confirmed it by standing in a location where the sun was behind a building and Venus above a tree which I used as a guide to sweep my binoculars upward until I found the planet with it's crescent oriented the same way as what I thought I saw unaided. $\endgroup$
    – Dan Is Fiddling By Firelight
    Commented 2 days ago
  • $\begingroup$ I didn't have any luck finding a reference, but maybe 15 years ago one of the big astronomy magazines (don't recall if Sky and Telescope, or Astronomy) challenged its readers to see if they could find Mercury mid-day. There was at least one person who reported success. $\endgroup$
    – Dan Is Fiddling By Firelight
    Commented 2 days ago
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Sirius - 8.61Ly

"I recovered Sirius with binoculars [from Zimbabwe], and twenty minutes before sunset I detected it with the naked eye"

On The Visibility of Sirius in Daylight - Henshaw, C. Journal: Journal of the British Astronomical Association, vol.94, no.5, p.221-222

enter image description here

Source: https://adsabs.harvard.edu/full/1984JBAA...94..221H

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You can see Saturn

But the circumstances have to be damn near perfect. I’ve done it when Saturn was within a hair’s breadth of the moon (or more accurately, about an eighth to a quarter lunar diameter) in the mid afternoon in Sydney about 15 years ago.

It was mentioned on the radio that it was visible so I looked and sure enough, there it was, a very faint dot just off the lower limb of the Moon about 3:30 pm. I remember because I was picking my son up from primary school and when I told him about it, he said he’d already seen it.

Of course, if you’re lucky enough to be alive at the right time, you can see a supernova.

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  • $\begingroup$ I'm curious, in what phase was the moon? $\endgroup$
    – Don Hatch
    Commented 12 hours ago
  • $\begingroup$ @DonHatch can’t remember but as it was up in daylight it can’t have been full $\endgroup$
    – Dale M
    Commented 11 hours ago

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