Astronomers Capture Clearest-Ever Image of Betelgeuse's Long-Suspected Companion Star

For decades, astronomers have wondered whether irregular dimming in Betelgeuse, one of the brightest and most-studied stars in the night sky, could be explained by a hidden companion orbiting close beside it. A team led by researchers at the Paris Observatory has now produced the clearest image yet of that companion, using the SPHERE instrument on ESO's Very Large Telescope in Chile.

The observations, taken in December 2024 when the companion star was at its widest apparent separation from Betelgeuse, show a faint object estimated at two to three times the mass of the Sun. The findings were published in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics in late July.

Betelgeuse itself is a red supergiant roughly 500 light-years from Earth, nearing the end of its life and expected to eventually explode as a supernova. Confirming a companion star helps explain some of its long-observed brightness cycles and gives astronomers a rare close-up view of a binary system involving a star this large.