HD 160342

HD 160342 is a star in the southern constellation of Ara. HD 160342 is its Henry Draper Catalogue designation. It has an apparent visual magnitude of 6.35, making it very faintly visible to the naked eye under ideal observing conditions. Based upon parallax measurements, is approximately distant from Earth.
In 1971, P. M. Corben announced that HD 160342 is a variable star, a discovery made using a telescope equipped with a photoelectric photometer at the Royal Observatory in South Africa. It was given its variable star designation, V626 Arae, in 1973.
With a stellar classification of M3 III, this is an evolved red giant that is on the asymptotic giant branch. It is a variable star that is classified as irregular, although changes in brightness of 0.1127 magnitudes at the rate of 0.37943 cycles per day have been detected in Hipparcos photometry.