Equatorial coordinate system

• declination ($delta$)
• right ascension ($alpha$) -also RA-, or hour angle ($H$) -also HA-

It is the most closely related to the geographic coordinate system, because they use the same fundamental plane, and the same poles. The projection of the Earth's equator onto the celestial sphere is called the celestial equator. Similarly, projecting the geographic poles onto the celestial sphere defines the north and south celestial poles.

There are two systems to specify the longitudinal (longitude-like) coordinate:

• the hour angle system is fixed to the Earth like the geographic coordinate system
• the right ascension system is fixed to the stars, thus, during a night or a few nights, it appears to J2000.0, for older data B1950.0) when specifying coordinates of planets, stars, galaxies, etc.

The latitudinal (latitude-like) angle of the equatorial system is called declination (Dec for short). It measures the angle of an object above or below the celestial equator. The longitudinal angle is called the right ascension (RA for short). It measures the angle of an object east of the vernal equinox point. Unlike longitude, right ascension is usually measured in hours instead of degrees, because the apparent rotation of the equatorial coordinate system is closely related to sidereal time and hour angle. Since a full rotation of the sky takes 24 hours of sidereal time to complete, there are (360 degrees / 24 hours) = 15 degrees in one hour of right ascension.