The seventh planet from the Sun, Uranus is unique: it rotates on its side, at a nearly 90-degree angle from the plane of its orbit. This causes extreme seasons since the planet’s poles experience many years of constant sunlight followed by an equal number of years of complete darkness. (Uranus takes 84 years to orbit the Sun.) Currently, it is late spring for the northern pole, which is visible on the images of this article; Uranus’ northern summer will be in 2028. In contrast, when Voyager 2 visited Uranus it was summer at the south pole. The south pole is now on the ‘dark side’ of the planet, out of view and facing the darkness of space.

This infrared image from Webb’s Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam) combines data from two filters at 1.4 and 3.0 microns, which are shown here in blue and orange, respectively. The planet displays a blue hue in the resulting representative-color image.

When Voyager 2 looked at Uranus, its camera showed an almost featureless blue-green ball in visible wavelengths. With the infrared wavelengths and extra sensitivity of Webb we see more detail, showing how dynamic the atmosphere of Uranus really is.