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Beginners
Everything you need to understand before your first purchase: what aperture really buys you, why magnification claims are marketing, and which mount suits a small British garden.
Updated August 2026 · Written by the TelescopeReviews.co.uk test team
Aperture is the diameter of the main lens or mirror and the single most important number. Focal length divided by eyepiece focal length gives magnification — which is why a bigger number on the box means nothing on its own.
Refractors use lenses and need little maintenance. Reflectors use mirrors and give far more aperture per pound. Catadioptrics such as Maksutovs fold a long focal length into a short tube — great for planets from a balcony.
1. Buying on magnification. 2. Buying a supermarket bundle with a wobbly photo tripod. 3. Expecting Hubble colour. 4. Skipping a red torch and ruining dark adaptation. 5. Ignoring cooldown — a mirror needs 20-30 minutes outside. 6. Starting on faint galaxies instead of the Moon and Jupiter. 7. Forgetting a case, so the scope lives in a damp shed.
Start with the Moon at low power, then Jupiter and its four bright moons. Move to the Pleiades and the Orion Nebula in winter, or the Ring Nebula and Albireo in summer. Give your eyes 20 minutes to adapt and keep the phone screen on night mode.
Check the live price on Amazon UK — we do not publish fixed prices.
| Model | Type | Aperture | Rating | Buy |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Sky-Watcher Skyliner 200P DobsonianBest overall for UK skiesBest Pick | Reflector (Dobsonian) | 200mm | 4.8 | Check price on Amazon UK → |
| Celestron NexStar 130SLTBest GoTo for beginners | Reflector, computerised | 130mm | 4.4 | Check price on Amazon UK → |
| Sky-Watcher Heritage 130P FlexTubeBest budget pick under £200 | Tabletop reflector | 130mm | 4.6 | Check price on Amazon UK → |
Sky-Watcher Skyliner 200P Dobsonian
Best overall for UK skies
Celestron NexStar 130SLT
Best GoTo for beginners
Sky-Watcher Heritage 130P FlexTube
Best budget pick under £200
The 200P gathers enough light to punch through typical British light pollution, showing Cassini's Division in Saturn's rings on a steady night from a suburban garden.
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Hand-controller GoTo finds 4,000+ objects for you, which matters when you only get twenty clear minutes before the next band of cloud arrives.
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Collapses to the size of a shoebox, so it lives in a cupboard and comes out on a garden table whenever the Met Office promises a clear spell.
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