![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() The astronomy community usually considers FirstScope and its variants to be “toy telescopes.” But it’s one of the only few working telescopes for sale near $50 in the US, and it doesn’t have a shaky mount. $300 range, refractor: Celestron Inspire 100AZ Refractor – The Celestron Inspire 100AZ is arguably quite inferior to the similarly-priced and larger tabletop dobsonian reflectors available, but the Inspire is a little more kid-friendly with features like a smartphone adapter and focus markings, as well as not requiring any collimation (periodic alignment of the optics) as reflectors do.The collapsible tube means it can be stored virtually anywhere when not in use. $300 range: Sky-Watcher Heritage 150P Tabletop Dobsonian – The whole telescope, though with a 6″ aperture, can still be picked up with one hand and fit in a duffel bag or suitcase.The Z114’s views are just a bit bigger, sharper, and brighter compared to the Z100, without much of a difference in portability. $225 range: Zhumell Z114 Tabletop Dobsonian – The Z114 is basically a scaled-up Z100, albeit unable to be attached to a tripod and with a properly adjustable primary mirror.It can also be attached to a photo tripod. There’s a reason we recommend it not just for kids but indeed for all ages at this price point. $150 range: Zhumell Z100 Tabletop Dobsonian – The Zhumell Z100 is the lowest priced telescope on the market with quality optics and comes with an easy-to-use and lightweight tabletop Dobsonian mount, some decent eyepieces and a red dot finder for aiming.Its views of the Moon, planets, and a few select bright deep-sky objects will blow kids away if they’re patient, and if something happens to it, it’s not too expensive of a loss-which might be good if you have particularly young children. $75 range: Celestron FirstScope Tabletop Dobsonian – While the FirstScope is admittedly a bit of a letdown for adults in terms of its usefulness and image quality, it’s at least stable, convenient, and easy to use.On the other hand, if you buy them a cheap junk telescope, you risk killing their enthusiasm for astronomy and permanently turning them away from it. However, there are some kid-friendly passable options in the sub-$150 price range that I will mention here if you can’t risk losing a lot of money in case your kid loses interest in the hobby faster than you anticipate. For a real starter-quality telescope, one should spend at least $150. But still, you’d be getting way less optical quality and value for your money if you go the refractor route. Refractors are more capable of withstanding rough handling by kids as well. Kids aren’t as picky about things like chromatic aberration, so a short refractor, which I wouldn’t recommend for an adult, will be fine for a child. Do they want to view land objects during the day? Only a refractor telescope can do that since reflectors (most of our recommendations in this guide are reflector telescopes with tabletop dobsonian mount design) give an upside-down image on terrestrial viewing. If you have a budget of more than $400, an older child, or intend to always use the telescope along with your child, it may be worth reading our regular guide for purchasing telescopes. Over the age of ten or eleven, you might be better off picking a full-fledged, adult-sized telescope for your child to use. Let’s get to the differentiators first.įirst, there’s age. A young child under five is simply not going to be able to grasp the complicated concepts behind viewing anything besides the Moon and simply won’t be able to use the instrument at all on their own-furthermore, there’s a high risk of them being unable to understand the danger of viewing the Sun and blinding themselves. Adult guidance would be required from time to time since telescopes require a bit of knowledge and maintenance (storage, cleaning, alignment, e.t.c). Usually, we recommend a tabletop Dobsonian for children, but your unique requirements might call for a different model. ![]() Budget, portability, and value for money should be the main deciding factors when you are trying to buy a telescope for your kid. ![]()
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