Moon

You can view either a map of the Earth showing the day and night regions at this moment, or view the Earth from the Sun, the Moon, the night side of the Earth, above any location on the planet specified by latitude, longitude and altitude, from a satellite in Earth orbit, or above various cities around the globe.

Images can be generated based on a full-colour image of the Earth by day and night, a topographical map of the Earth, up-to-date weather satellite imagery, or a composite image of cloud cover superimposed on a map of the Earth, a colour composite which shows clouds, land and sea temperatures, and ice, or the global distribution of water vapour. Expert mode allows you additional control over the generation of the image. You can compose a custom request with frequently-used parameters and save it as a hotlist or bookmark item in your browser. Please consult the Details for additional information and answers to frequently-asked questions.

Viewing the Moon

In addition to the Earth, you can also view the Moon from the Earth, Sun, night side, above named formations on the lunar surface. or as a map showing day and night. You can also make expert and custom images of the Moon. A related document compares the appearance of the Moon at perigee and apogee, including an interactive Perigee and Apogee Calculator.

Browser Requirements

To use the Earth and Moon Viewer, you need a graphical Web browser with forms support and the ability to display GIF and JPEG images. In order to pan around the map or globe by clicking within the image, your browser must support "Client-Side Image Maps"--if you don't know what this means, don't worry: if your browser doesn't support the feature, you'll see a page which explains how to proceed.

Credits