A Colorful Solar Corona over the Himalayas
11.01.2016

What are those colorful rings around the Sun? A corona visible only to Earth observers in the right place at the right time. Rings like this will sometimes appear when the Sun or Moon is seen through thin clouds.

August Lunar Eclipse
9.08.2017

August's Full Moon is framed in this sharp, high dynamic range composition. Captured before sunrise on August 8 from Sydney, Australia, south is up and the Earth's dark, umbral shadow is at the left, near the maximum phase of a partial lunar eclipse.

Andes Sunset Eclipse
15.07.2010

On July 11, after a long trek eastward across the southern Pacific Ocean, the Moon's shadow reached landfall in South America. In a total solar eclipse close to sunset, silhouetted Moon and Sun hugged the western horizon, seen here above the Andes mountains near the continent's southern tip.

Milky Way over Chilean Volcanoes
21.08.2017

Sometimes, the sky mimics the ground. Taken in 2017 May from the Atacama Desert in Chile, the foreground of the featured image encompasses the dipping edge of the caldera of an extinct volcano. Poetically echoing the dip below is the arch of our Milky Way Galaxy above.

Perseid Meteors over Turkey
1.08.2017

The Perseid Meteor Shower, usually the best meteor shower of the year, will peak late next week. A person watching a clear sky from a dark location might see a bright meteor every minute.

Like a Diamond in the Sky
17.11.2012

A dark Sun hung over Queensland, Australia on Wednesday morning during a much anticipated total solar eclipse. Storm clouds threatened to spoil the view along the northern coast, but minutes before totality the clouds parted.

Warped Sky: Star Trails Panorama
11.07.2010

What's happened to the sky? A time warp, of sorts, and a digital space warp too. The time warp occurs because this image captured in a single frame a four hour exposure of the night sky. As a result, prominent star trails are visible.

APOD: 2026 August 1 Б Buck Moon and Belt of Venus
1.08.2026

The Buck Moon is a traditional name for the full moon of July. In this colorful Adriatic sea and skyscape captured on July 28 from Krk Island along the coast of Croatia, a full Buck Moon is just rising over distant mountains.

APOD: 2026 September 5 Б Chasing the Moon s Shadow
5.09.2026

Chasing the shadow of a New Moon, NASAБs WB-57F high altitude research aircraft took to the skies off the coast of Iceland on August 12 to observe a total solar eclipse. At 50,000 feet the aircraft was piloted along the precisely determined path of totality to maximize its time in the MoonБs shadow.

Sunshine, Earthshine
19.03.2015

Today's date marks an Equinox and a New Moon. Remarkably, while the exact timing of both geocentric events occur within a span of only 13 hours, the moon also reaches its new phase only 14 hours after perigee, the closest point in its orbit.