Nightshift: Stargazing & Astronomy
TL;DR (Features at a glance)
☆ Worldwide stargazing conditions and forecast
☆ Celestial event calendar and astronomy highlights
☆ Over 15,000 deep-sky objects
☆ Advanced object visibility prediction for your telescopes
Clear skies and darkness: stargazing weather forecast
See darkness and cloud cover forecast for any location in the world and find tonight's best observing opportunities. A comprehensible twilight diagram shows you darkness, weather and observing conditions for any night at a glance. Receive notifications when conditions are good for any observing location.
Never miss out on the highlights of tonight's sky
Astronomy events, visible planets, active meteor showers, noctilucent clouds, moon phases, oppositions, greatest elongations, lunar eclipses and rise and set times right from the app's dashboard.
Save your favourite stargazing locations
Build a database of your favourite observing locations to get location-specific advice about darkness, cloud cover and visibility of celestial objects.
Moon phases and lunar eclipses
Find out the current phase of the Moon and the exact time and date of the next full moon, new moon and first and last quarter. Nightshift helps you plan the best moments for lunar observation or prevent moonlight from disturbing your deep-sky observing session. Nightshift contains a calendar with all partial and total lunar eclipses from 1801 to 2200 and gives location specific advice on the visibility of a blood moon from your favourite stargazing spot.
Planets of the solar system
Nightshift shows all the visible planets for tonight and the constellations they are in to quickly locate them in the night sky. The event calendar tells you exactly when the next opposition of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune takes place so you can easily plan your planetary observing sessions. For Venus and Mercury, the app displays the moment of the greatest elongation to determine the best morning and evening visibility of the inner planets. Of course, a twilight diagram is available for all planets to find the best opportunities to observe them on any night and the telescopes needed for optimal observation.
Over 15,000 deep-sky objects
Nightshift comes packed with a large database of deep-sky objects, including the complete Messier, Caldwell, NGC and IC catalogues. A darkness and clear sky diagram indicates when the conditions are favourable to observe your favourite galaxies, globular clusters, nebulae and other wonders of the deep space.
Tailored advice for all celestial objects
Observing conditions and viewing opportunities adjusted for the rise and set times of the Moon, planets and all deep-sky objects from your location.
Comprehensive info from renowned catalogues
In-depth information on all celestial objects, including classification, brightness, angular size, distance and cross references with other astronomy catalogues.
Visibility prediction for telecopes, binoculars and naked eye
State-of-the-art algorithms predict if celestial objects are within reach of your equipment. The visibility calculator shows you if your favourite planet, galaxy or other heavenly body is visible with your own telescopes or binoculars, taking air mass and predicted atmospheric extinction into account.
Spread the word
Clear skies on your favourite stargazing spot? Share your enthusiasm with your social network right from the app.
Icon: NPS/Quinn (CC-BY 2.0)
Discover the world of astronomy
Start stargazing tonight with Nightshift and keep track of the fascinating events of the night sky!
Category : Education
Reviews (25)
Clear and descriptive tools to use to see what's good to watch in your area. I'm just getting into astronomy and it's a great tool to find something good to look at. The weather and viewing descriptions are great.
The app is great and quite accurate on viewing conditions. The reason i give it 4 stars instead of 5 is it lacks a live view of the night sky that would allow you to use your phone to find an object
Pretty useful and accurate in my area, let's me know if there will even be a point in getting excited about getting the telescope out! Good UI as well!
So far I like this app. It's kinda accurate. Which is dope. Only thing I wish it had was coordinates to where the planets and stars where. Maybe like that it would make things even easier to find. But overall, like the app.
Great for Beginners like me. I can't tell you about all the features yet but so far it's been an easy guide. Nice to be able to sync it to my telescope
VERY helpful app, as I am trying to confirm UAP activity, so knowing what is supposed to be where, and what is supposed to moving when is CRUCIAL to rule out what are considered to be normal events in outer space such as meteor showers and which planets are visible when, which night, etc. I also use the satellite tracker to rule out that as well.😎👍
Super easy to use and always accurate! My go to source for identification in the night sky!
Excellent App! This is a handy app to have on your smartphone even if you aren't planning on stargazing.
Essential for observing. None of my other gear matters if the weather doesn't cooperate. All my observing evenings start with this app!
Brilliantly simple and informative app. Great to find out about astronomical events, meteor showers, eclipses, sunrise and sunset and so on. Just so well laid out and the ads are not intrusive.
Instant 5* and subscription. It's clear that this app was created by an enthusiastic astronomer. Absolutely perfect for planning a session.
Well organized, very informative, and handy. Smart design overall.
AWESOME for telescope owners ! As someone who is just starting this hobby i was looking for this app. I've tried 6 others, but this is the one. You can easily find out viewing conditions and highlights of what to look at, and when conditions are moderate or worse it will even tell you when the next chance is for that object. Love the notifications; viewing conditions are good and these objects that are best for tonight; as i don't have enough spare time to plan my viewings.
A different and fresh approach to presenting the current status of the sky. I like the clarity of the various factors affecting a good see.
Inaccurate but perhaps that's the basis of cod prediction? Easy to use, full of features
Very helpful app, I live in colorado which has a reputation for unpredictable weather. And this app. This god damn amazing app has literally never let me down, I use it regularly to plan trips away from the city and to see if the conditions will be right for just some casual backyard stargazing. The layout is simple and easy to use. The included events section of the app is really helpful.
A lot of nightly information in one app. Organized well.
A very nice idea plagued by a few important omitted things. First of all you cannot get the visibility chart for today's night. You see just a chart for the current time. This isn't good for planning. Second, there are no lists for your favourite objects, one has to search again and again for these. Also, monthly visibility charts would be a very useful addition as they are part of planning. It is free though and the effort of the developer for sure is respected.
There are many excellent aspects to this app, and I feel similar to many reviewers about its scope. However, even having put in information on my telescopes, I get a huge list of potential targets for viewing, many of which are noted as "invisible", even in my 12" SCT. Then, stepping back, I am sent to the main page and not simply to the where I was in the visible objects list! Now, I must start all over again, at the beginning of the list sorted by transit time! This, to me, is poor design!
I use a variety of astronomy apps. I use Nightshift mainly for quick access to transit times of notable objects on a given night, and other great info on the daily highlights tab. I like the default low-intensity monochromatic color scheme that always assumes I'm using it in the dark. I'm an app developer myself, and it's evident they put a lot of thought and engineering into the UI/UX. Overall great for knowing the notable events in the sky on any given night.
It's very good I like the ,moon phase thing, when it's good to observe, and the cloud map don't forget the telescope thing so you can see what telescope is the best for your viewing. If they added one more thing I would change my review. And that is widgets so you can see the moon phase and when is it good to observe with out touching the app just look at the widget. I would change my review if you add widgets so you can add them to your home screen.
This app was fantastic up until a week or 2 ago. It kept coming up no stargazing when infant it was clear skies and following night it would say excellent viewing but it was 100% cloud cover. Even as I write this it's saying no viewing tonight but it's perfect outside. I've never had this problem with the app before. I've used it heaps and have come to rely on it. Has anyone else experienced this?
Just a fantastic app that has all one needs for spontaneous stargazing and planning ahead. Easy to use, well supported, a great UI, smartly chosen services for weather and other data, all make for an invaluable assistant for amateur astronomers. My only criticism is the lack of a widget. That would be a useful tool.
Great app. It combines the functions of four other apps and websites I've been using to plan astrophotography ventures. Great layout, good info, I love the ability to find deep sky objects, and see when they are the most visible. I had a few bugs when first using (trouble getting it to change dates) but nothing since.
It keeps getting better, and offers a good peek at future observing conditions at a glance. The link to weather models on meteoblue is a super useful tool. The only (minor) issue is the "excellent conditions" that keeps coming when you either look too far in the future or when weather data are unavailable for some reason.