The 9 Best Telescopes

For most adults ready for a serious first scope, the Sky-Watcher Classic 200 gathers the most light for the money: an eight-inch mirror in a solid tube on a plain swiveling base. You aim it by hand, and the two included eyepieces bring up Saturn's rings, Jupiter's cloud bands and bright star clusters. The closed tube holds its mirror alignment well from night to night. It is heavy, though, and takes two trips to carry outside.

Small homes and tight budgets suit the Sky-Watcher Heritage 150, a six-inch mirror in a tube that slides shut to fit on a closet shelf. It sits on a short base meant for a sturdy surface and works straight from the box. Telescopic Watch made it the top pick in its price range and suggests setting it on a milk crate rather than a wobbly table. The focuser feels coarse and can be fiddly at high power.

If finding things in the sky sounds like the hard part, the Celestron StarSense Explorer 8-Inch solves it with your phone. A dock on the tube uses the phone's camera to read the stars around it, and arrows on the screen lead you to each target. The eight-inch mirror then shows faint clusters and the glow of nebulae. Only one eyepiece is included, and a second one for higher power is worth budgeting for.

The Celestron NexStar 8SE does the finding and the following for you. After a short alignment on bright stars, its motorized arm swings to any of about 40,000 objects and keeps them centered as the sky turns. The orange tube folds a long light path into a short body, so the Moon and planets look crisp and large from a compact package. The tripod is light for this tube and shakes when you touch the focus knob.

Beginners who want to stand while they look should consider the Celestron StarSense Explorer DX 130AZ. A phone dock and app match the stars your phone sees and steer you to each target with arrows, while slow-motion knobs nudge the view along as objects drift. The five-inch mirror shows sharp craters on the Moon and the rings of Saturn. The tripod can wobble during focusing, and the app sometimes loses its place and needs a reset.

Think of the ZWO Seestar S30 Pro as a camera that knows the sky. There's no eyepiece: you pick a target in the phone app, it finds the object on its own, then stacks short exposures into a color picture of a nebula or galaxy within minutes, from a bright suburban yard. A solar filter comes in the box. Planets come out small, and long sessions can show smeared star trails.

The Celestron StarSense Explorer LT 114AZ is the low-cost way into phone-guided stargazing. Its mirror is big enough for Saturn's rings, Jupiter's moons and the brightest clusters, and the light build makes it simple to carry out for a quick look before bed. The tripod and mount are the weak spot: they flex when you touch the scope, so give the view a moment to settle after each nudge.

Balcony and apartment stargazers short on storage space can lean on the Celestron NexStar 127SLT. Its stubby closed tube is built for high power, which suits the Moon, planets and double stars, and a motorized mount finds and tracks targets from a hand controller. The narrow view makes big clusters and nebulae hard to frame, and the mount can shake and grind under the tube.

Deep-sky fans who want more light than an eight-inch mirror gives should look at the Sky-Watcher Flextube 250. Its ten-inch mirror pulls in fainter galaxies and more stars inside each cluster, and the open tube slides down on rods so the scope fits in a car. Sliding it shut saves less space than you might hope, though, and the open frame needs a cloth shroud to block stray light and dew.