OVERVIEW
] MOONEuropa is a moon of Jupiter. It orbits Jupiter at a mean distance of 671 100 . It has a mass of 8.03×10⁻³ and a mean radius of 0.24 · 1561 . It was discovered in 1610.
An ice-wrapped moon concealing a global ocean with more water than all of Earth's seas — one of the most promising places to look for life.
- WHAT IT IS
- Moon of Jupiter
- HOW FAR
- 671 100
- HOW BIG
- 0.24 · 1561
- ONE ORBIT TAKES
- 3.53
Its average distance from Jupiter, not from Earth.
Its mean radius: half the width across.
One trip round Jupiter.
IMAGES
] 4 FRAMES- NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Kevin M. Gill
CC BY 2.0 - NASA/JPL-Caltech/SwRI/MSSS/Kevin M. Gill
CC BY 3.0 - NASA, ESA, W. Sparks (STScI), and the USGS Astrogeology Science Center
CC BY 4.0 - NASA/JPL/DLR
Public domain
CATALOG DATA
] 8 FIELDSThe raw catalogue values, as the source published them, with the error bars where one was published — sorted by what each set of figures is about rather than by the order they happened to be stored in.
WHAT IT IS MADE OF
What the object is in itself, rather than how it happens to look from here.
- Mean density
- 3.013 ±0.0017
THE ORBIT
The shape of the path, where the object sits on it, and the instant those figures were true of. An orbit is a fit to observations and drifts away from the real one either side of its epoch.
- Orbits
- Jupiter
- Orbital period
- 3.525463
- Eccentricity
- Inclination
- 0.5
WHEN IT WAS FOUND
Who first saw it, from where, and by what method.
- Discovered by
- Galileo
OTHER NAMES AND NUMBERS
The identifiers other catalogues file this object under, for anyone joining this data to theirs.
- JPL satellite code
- 502
WHERE THESE FIGURES CAME FROM
Which catalogue, paper or model each of the fields above was read from, where the source named one.
- Ephemeris
- JUP365
ALSO KNOWN AS
] 1 DESIGNATIONS- Common name Europa
CITE THIS PAGE
] DR1This page is live and its numbers move when an upstream refreshes, so the citation names the release the rows belong to rather than the day you read them. The release itself is frozen, republished as a bundle, and is what a data-availability statement should point at.
SpaceCatalog. Europa [catalogue entry]. Data release DR1 (2026-08-21). https://spacecatalog.org/object/europa
@misc{spacecatalog_europa,
author = {{SpaceCatalog}},
title = {{Europa}},
howpublished = {SpaceCatalog, data release DR1 (2026-08-21)},
year = {2026},
url = {https://spacecatalog.org/object/europa},
note = {Catalogue entry, data release DR1 (2026-08-21). Values from JPL Planetary Satellite Data.}
}The values above were taken from JPL Planetary Satellite Data — Public domain (NASA/JPL). Citing this page does not replace citing that catalogue.
RECENT ACTIVITY
] 2 ITEMS- NASA’s Juno Measures Thickness of Europa’s Ice Shell2026-01-27 · NASA/JPL · RELEASE
- NASA’s Europa Clipper Radar Instrument Proves Itself at Mars2025-08-01 · NASA/JPL · RELEASE
NASA/JPL · UPDATED DAILY