Discovered by Grigory Neujmin at the Simeiz Observatory in 1937,[15] this background asteroid was later named from the Latin word "Magnya", which means "clear, bright, wonderful" when literally translated into Russian.

[3] The spectrum of this object show that it has a basaltic surface, which may indicate that it is a remnant from a larger parent body that underwent differentiation prior to breaking up.

[12] Modeling also confirmed that the body is a slightly elongated ellipsoid, and revealed that it is rotating along the smallest axis and that it has an almost homogeneous surface.

[5][6][7] The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link adopts the results obtained by the VLT, that is an albedo of 0.37 and takes a diameter of 17.4 kilometers based on an absolute magnitude of 10.5.

[3] This minor planet was named after "Magnya", which means "clear, bright, wonderful" when literally translated from Latin into Russian.