First identification and absolute magnitudes of the red clump stars in the Solar neighbourhood for WISE

•The RC stars are identified with the WISE photometry for the first time.•The WISE absolute magnitudes and a colour of the RC stars are estimated.•The 2MASS absolute magnitudes and colours of the RC stars are also estimated.

We present the first determination of absolute magnitudes for the red clump (RC) stars with the Wide–field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). We used recently reduced parallaxes taken from the Hipparcos catalogue and identified 3889 RC stars with the WISE photometry in the Solar neighbourhood. Mode values estimated from the distributions of absolute magnitudes and a colour of the RC stars in WISE   photometry are MW1=-1.635±0.026,MW3=-1.606±0.024 and (W1-W3)0=-0.028±0.001(W1-W3)0=-0.028±0.001 mag. These values are consistent with those obtained from the transformation formulae using 2MASS data. Distances of the RC stars estimated by using their MW1MW1 and MW3MW3 absolute magnitudes are in agreement with the ones calculated by the spectrophotometric method, as well. These WISE absolute magnitudes can be used in astrophysical researches where distance plays an important role.