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Neptune has 13 known Moons . The largest by far is Triton , discovered by William Lassell just 17 days after the discovery of Neptune itself. Two moons discovered in 2002 and 2003 , Psamathe and S/2002 N 4, have the largest orbits of any moons discovered in the Solar system to date. They take 25 years to orbit Neptune at an average of 125 times the distance between Earth and the Moon. THE NATURAL SATELLITES The Neptunian moons are listed here by orbital period, from shortest to longest. Triton, which is not only massive enough for its surface to have Collapsed into a Spheroid , but is comparable in size to our own moon, is highlighted in purple. Irregular (captured) moons are shown in grey. (Triton is also thought to be captured.)
NAMING NOTES Some , 1162 Larissa . Note that Triton did not have an official name until the 20th Century . Although the name was suggested in 1880 by Camille Flammarion , it did not come into common use until at least the 1930 s. Usually, it was simply known as "the satellite of Neptune" (the second satellite, Nereid , was not discovered until 1949 ). SEE ALSO
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