Abstract Nanosatellites have serious limitations on the onboard energy. Therefore, it is necessary to find a method of constructing a nominal reorientation trajectory that will optimally use the resources available onboard. In this paper the process of constructing of a nominal reorientation trajectory in the plane of nanosatellite orbit is considered. The problem of constructing a nominal reorientation trajectory was solved using the inverse dynamic problem method and Pontryagin maximum principle. A comparison of the results obtained using these two methods was made. As a result, it was noted that the solution obtained by the inverse dynamic problem method is close to the solution obtained using the Pontryagin maximum principle. This allows us to speak about the optimality of the inverse dynamics problem method.