The Best Telescopes for Beginners

Aperture and Magnification

• The most important trait of a telescope is the size of its aperture, the main lens or mirror that collects light. In general, the larger the aperture is the more powerful the telescope will be, and this should always be your first question when considering a telescope purchase.

  One trick a manufacturer will use to try to sell a bad scope is to boast about the magnification power of the telescope rather than its aperture. The most notorious instances of these are department store telescopes with two or three-inch apertures boasting of magnification power of up to 400 or 500 times. In reality, magnification level depends on the size of the replaceable eyepiece, but the level of useful magnification is limited to about 50 times the size of the aperture in inches, and that is only if high-quality optics are used. Beyond this point, no more detail is revealed and the image seen through the eyepiece, while larger, is increasingly dim and blurry.

Types of Telescopes

• There are three broad types of telescopes: refractors, reflectors and compound. Each telescope type has its own strengths and weaknesses, and all three can make for a good beginner's scope.

  Refractors are the most familiar telescopes to people new to star-gazing. Light passes through a lens on one end which focuses it on the eye-piece on the other end. They are the most expensive telescopes per inch of aperture, but a relatively small, quality refractor can make a good beginner's telescope for viewing the moon and planets.

  Reflectors function using mirrors rather than lenses to collect light. They are larger and cheaper per inch of aperture than a reflector, but may be heavier and require more maintenance. However, medium-size reflectors with four- to eight-inch apertures can make wonderful beginner scopes.

  Compound telescopes combine features of both refractors and reflectors. They are slightly more expensive than reflectors and slightly cheaper than refractors.

A Good Mount

• There is a wide variety of mount types. For the beginner, the most important thing to consider is that a mount must be stable. Even small vibrations of the scope can be dizzying at higher magnifications.

  Secondly, it should be easy to make very fine adjustments to the direction the telescope points, with the better mounts including mechanical or electric controls for smoothly adjusting the telescope's position by small increments.