Dwarf-system satellite
Charon
A companion so large that Pluto and Charon orbit a shared point in space.
Charon is roughly half Pluto’s diameter, giving the pair an unusually balanced relationship. Both bodies are tidally locked, so the same hemispheres continually face one another.
- Orbit representation
- Representative mean elements
- Surface
- derived map
Reference measurements
The numbers that shape this world
- Mean radius
- 606 km
- Mean orbital distance
- 19,596 km
- Orbital period
- 6.387 days
- Eccentricity
- 0
- Inclination
- 0°Pluto equatorial plane
- Orbit plane
- Source-backed
System portrait
A binary-like dwarf-planet system
The Pluto–Charon barycentre lies outside Pluto. Helios therefore treats the pair as a coupled system rather than placing a tiny decorative moon around a fixed primary.
System geometry
Charon around Pluto
Charon orbits at a mean distance of 19,596 km with a period of 6.387 days. Its catalogued eccentricity is 0, and the catalogued inclination is 0° relative to Pluto equatorial plane. Missing angular orientation stays explicitly representative.
Representation notes
What Explore is showing
Pluto–Charon is shown around a shared visual barycentre using sourced size, mean separation and a source-backed near-zero inclination to Pluto's equator. Node/periapsis orientation remains representative.
Reviewed official partial imagery prepared as a 1K display texture. Unobserved areas are softly completed from the observed hemisphere so the globe remains natural-looking in motion; the body summary identifies those regions as reconstructed rather than directly observed. Final seam, pole and landmark review remains device-dependent.
Provenance