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After taking a long look–no pun intended– at the options out there we’ve put together a list of the best refractor telescopes for the money. Since telescopes run a huge range of sizes and prices, we’ve narrowed it down to the best telescopes for citizen and amateur astronomers, beginning star gazers and even birdwatchers. If you’d like to check out some more quality pieces, check out our review of the best outdoor gear.
Our top pick for the best refractor telescope, the Gskyer 600 x 90mm Telescope, is a stellar value with its bright f/6.7 focal ratio, fully coated optics and set of three different eyepieces with a Barlow lens for 3x extra magnification.
Award: Top Pick
WHY WE LIKE IT: A larger aperture and brighter focal ratio- f/6.7–than just about any refracting telescope at this price, plus it’s easy to set up and maneuver with its adjustable aluminum tripod. It’s great for budding astronomers at the intermediate to enthusiast level, and makes a great gift for a middle or high school student.
The Gskyer 600mm x 90 mm refracting telescope is a great mid-range choice for amateur astronomers. It has enough magnification and good enough optics to show the rings of Saturn, provided you know where to point it, that is. Luckily, this backyard telescope comes with an adjustable, swiveling and panning tripod so it’s easy to change direction.
It also benefits from high quality optics with anti-reflective blue coating, a helpfully bright f/6.7 focal ratio and a set of three eyepieces as well as a Barlow lens for magnification. The eyepieces are 25mm, 10mm and 5mm, giving you up to 120x magnification.
Award: Honorable Mention
WHY WE LIKE IT: This 900mm refracting telescope features an upright image, includes helpful astronomy software and a finder scope. It makes a great choice for beginning amateur astronomers or high school age astronomy enthusiasts.
A great introduction to stargazing, this Celestron telescope benefits from a long focal length and includes some useful features such as a finder scope, tripod with fine azimuth and altitude control and it even comes with educational Starry Night software.
While it is not as bright as some other refracting telescopes out there, such as the Gskyer (our top pick) or the Meade Star Pro (our #3 choice,) this Celestron 900 x70mm telescope is a relative bargain at less than half the cost of those wider aperture telescopes. The slimmer design also makes it more portable, and the very highly rated Starry Night software makes it easier to make sense of what you’re looking at among the stars. While it is designed with students of astronomy and beginning stargazers in mind, the Celestron also makes a great back-up instrument for more experienced hobbyists. If you work up a sweat in the process, the best coolling towel will come in handy.
Award: Best Enthusiast
WHY WE LIKE IT: A high-quality instrument with a wide 102-mm aperture and 204x total effective magnification, the Meade Star Pro lets you see more distant objects than any other refracting telescope on our list. It’s great for intermediate-level astronomy enthusiasts or citizen astronomers wanting to see features like Jupiter’s moons.
The 660 x 102mm Meade Star Pro refracting telescope features high quality optics with fully coated glass and offers the brightest view of any of the refracting telescopes on our list. It also includes three different eyepieces with low, medium and high magnification as well as a Barlow lens. It’s suitable for viewing nebulae, constellations, planets and the rings of Saturn. It comes with a specially designed tripod that features two high precision, slow motion cable controls for azimuth and altitude, so you can find the spot you want to look at in the night sky.
This Meade refracting telescope comes with Auto Star Suite Astronomer Edition software on DVD. It also comes with a very handy smartphone adapter, letting you take pictures with your iPhone or other smartphones through the eyepiece. Also, check out the Meade Instruments Infinity 102mm Refracting Telescope which has the same wide telescope aperture and an f/5.9 focal ratio, which will come in handy for your next celestial object hunt. Speaking of hunt, the best carabiner is quite handy for those outdoor hunts.
Award: Best for Travel/Budget Friendly
WHY WE LIKE IT: Compact size plus some sophisticated features like a useful 3X magnification Barlow lens for the eyepiece make this bargain 400 x 70 mm telescope worth a look. It’s great for the traveling hobbyists, such as birdwatchers, amateur stargazers and astronomy students.
The MaxUSee 400 x 70mm telescope is a great starter scope for young space enthusiasts. A relative bargain, it includes advanced features like a diagonal prism so that the image you see appears right-side-up, a Barlow lens for increasing the eyepiece magnification, and a spotting scope. It also comes with an adjustable universal smartphone adapter, great for taking and sharing pictures of the images seen through the telescope.
The MaxUSee 400 x 70 is also a great travel telescope. It weighs just over five pounds and comes with a backpack so it’s easy to pack up and take with you. It may not be as bright or magnify as much as some higher end astronomy telescopes, but its shorter focal length also makes the MaxUSee more useful for terrestrial viewing activities like bird watching or whale watching.
Award: Best Travel Enthusiast
WHY WE LIKE IT: This equatorial mount rich field refractor telescope has a very bright f/5.0 focal ratio for sharp, beautiful images, along with some high-end usability features. It’s great for hobbyist stargazers on the go since it renders a high quality image yet weighs just 10 pounds.
The Orion Observer 80 ST is a refracting telescope designed for enthusiasts and somewhat knowledgeable amateur citizen astronomers. It provides a very bright image thanks to its f/5.0 focal ratio. It comes supplied with an equatorial mount and a tripod brimming with astronomer-friendly handling features like super-smooth slow motion azimuth and altitude controls.
Portability is another plus for the Orion Observer 80 ST, since it’s less than two feet long overall and the tripod folds up smoothly. Weight is around 10 lbs, making it lighter than most enthusiast models with comparable image quality and features.
Award: Best Budget for Kids
WHY WE LIKE IT: An affordable and ultra lightweight, small telescope that’s very easy to set up. It’s great for kids, students in beginning astronomy classes and even birdwatchers.
The ECOO 70mm is a great starter telescope since it includes many of the features of the bigger, more expensive single refractors on our list while coming in a bargain friendly price point and weighing only about 4 pounds. This 18” telescope also comes with a carrying bag so it’s extra portable, making it even more useful for daytime terrestrial activities like bird-watching in the fields. Its narrow-is 70mm aperture and lower magnification might even be an advantage for such activities.
It also makes a great gift and is among the most kid-friendly telescopes on our list, since it requires no tools for set up and is easy to point. While it lacks the fine-tuning adjustments like slow motion azimuth and altitude controls and the high magnification as found on the Meade Star Pro (our #3 pick) the ECOO 70mm provides a great intro to refracting telescopes.
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Award: Best Budget
WHY WE LIKE IT: Convenient and easy to set up, the TELMU comes with all you need to start amateur astronomy or get a closer look at the moon, plus the included phone adapter makes it easy to take and share photos of the moon’s features. It’s great for middle school science fair hopefuls as well as casual astronomers wanting a telescope that’s easy to travel with.
The TELMU 70mm aperture refracting telescope is a great budget choice for beginning astronomers and it makes a great gift for any middle-grades age kids 8-13 who are into science and outer space. Lighter and shorter than most of the telescopes on our list, the TELMU is under 18” end to end and weighs less than six pounds. It even comes with a free backpack for travel.
While it doesn’t offer the kind of brightness or absolute magnification you get with higher end models like the Meade Star Pro (our #3 pick) the TELMU is easier to carry around. Its more modest range makes it fun for daytime terrestrial observation–think birdwatching– as well. Another good telescope for amateur astronomers is the Sky-Watcher Pro 80Ed which has a focal ratio of f/7.5.
