NGC 6496 is a globular cluster which is in the direction of the bulge and putative members of this subgroup,[clarification needed] based on observations collected with the WFPC2 on board the Hubble Space Telescope. NGC 6496 was originally believed[who?] to be a member of the disc system of GC, but scientists questioned this classification. It was instead suggested[who?] that NGC 6496, together with two other clusters, NGC 6624 and NGC 6637, could be halo clusters with strongly inclined orbits. NGC 6496 lies in the Southern sky at RA=17:59:03.68 and Dec=-44:15:57.4.[6]
The first CMD presented of NGC 6496 had photometry reaching 2 mag below the horizontal branch, disclosing for the first time the usual red arm of the metal-rich clusters. The extinction towards NGC 6496 is uncertain, with estimates ranging between E(B-V) = 0.09 and E(B-V) = 0.24.[7]