Published online by Cambridge University Press: 26 August 2011
Starspots are being observed with many different techniques but not always with coherent results. In particular not if model-dependent data analysis must be employed, e.g. through two-dimensional spot modelling of one-dimensional photometric light curves. I review the zoo of currently available physical spot parameters, i.e. their size, temperature and variability time scales, and also compare results from different techniques. Most of the current values come from Doppler imaging and multi-color photometry. I also list a few cases where starspot detections turned out to be very different to the solar analog.