This page covers 10 moons whose names begin with M, ranging from “Mab” to “Mundilfari.” These natural satellites orbit several planets in our solar system, including Earth, Jupiter, Saturn, and Uranus. They vary widely in size, from giant moons hundreds of kilometers wide to tiny irregular bodies just a few kilometers across. Scientists study them to understand how planets form, how ring systems work, and how the solar system evolved over billions of years.
Moons are natural objects held in orbit around a planet by gravity. They have inspired mythology, shaped human calendars, and driven some of the most ambitious exploration missions in history. Earth’s Moon was the first world beyond our planet that humans visited, and it remains one of the most studied objects in all of space.
Below you’ll find the table with Moon, Parent Planet, Diameter (km), Discovery Year, and Description.
Moon: The official name of each moon, which you can use to search for more details or compare entries across this list.
Parent Planet: The planet each moon orbits, helping you place it in the broader context of our solar system.
Diameter (km): The approximate size of each moon in kilometers, so you can easily compare how large or small each one is.
Discovery Year: The year scientists first identified each moon, giving you a sense of how recently or long ago it became known.
Description: A brief summary of each moon’s key traits, location, and what makes it particularly interesting or notable.
Moons
Moon
Parent Planet
Diameter (km)
Discovery Year
Mab
Uranus
12
2003
Megaclite
Jupiter
5
2000
Margaret
Uranus
20
2003
Methone
Saturn
3
2004
Metis
Jupiter
43
1979
Mimas
Saturn
396
1789
Miranda
Uranus
472
1948
Mneme
Jupiter
2
2000
Moon
Earth
3,475
Prehistoric
Mundilfari
Saturn
7
2000
Descriptions
Mab
A tiny inner moon of Uranus, Mab is thought to be the main source of the planet’s faint mu ring. It measures only about 12 kilometers across and was found using the Hubble Space Telescope.
Megaclite
An outer irregular moon of Jupiter belonging to the retrograde Pasiphae group, Megaclite orbits far from the planet. It was discovered in 2000 as part of a large ground-based survey of Jupiter’s distant moons.
Margaret
Margaret is the only known prograde irregular moon of Uranus, orbiting in the opposite direction from most of Uranus’s other irregular moons. It is named after a character in Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing.
Methone
Methone is a tiny, egg-shaped moon of Saturn orbiting between Mimas and Enceladus. Its strikingly smooth surface with almost no craters suggests it is coated in a layer of fine dust or loose particles.
Metis
Metis is a small inner moon of Jupiter that orbits just inside the planet’s main ring, helping to maintain its inner edge. It was first spotted in images taken by the Voyager 1 spacecraft.
Mimas
Mimas is one of Saturn’s midsized moons, best known for its enormous Herschel Crater, which makes it look strikingly like the Death Star from Star Wars. William Herschel discovered it in 1789.
Miranda
Miranda is the smallest of Uranus’s five major moons and has one of the most dramatically varied surfaces in the solar system, featuring towering cliffs, canyons, and chaotic jumbled terrain. Gerard Kuiper discovered it in 1948.
Mneme
Mneme is one of Jupiter’s many tiny outer irregular moons, belonging to the retrograde Ananke group. Named after the ancient Greek Muse of memory, it measures only about 2 kilometers in diameter.
Moon
The Moon is Earth’s only natural satellite and the fifth-largest moon in the solar system. It governs Earth’s tides, stabilizes our axial tilt, and became the first extraterrestrial body visited by humans when Apollo 11 landed in 1969.
Mundilfari
Mundilfari is a small retrograde irregular moon of Saturn belonging to its Norse-named group of outer moons. In Norse mythology, Mundilfari is said to be the father of the personifications of the Moon and the Sun.
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