# Live Sky Chart - Tonight's Stars, Constellations, Planets and Rise Times

> Free live sky chart for any city or latitude and time: 1,267 bright stars, 51 constellations, the Sun, Moon and planets, and rise, transit and set times.

- URL: https://qilingtools.com/en/physics/sky-chart
- Category: Physics Tools (https://qilingtools.com/en/physics)
- Tags: [Physics](https://qilingtools.com/en/tags/physics), [Education](https://qilingtools.com/en/tags/education)
- Last updated: 2026-10-29
- Price: Free, no sign-up
- Privacy: Runs locally in the browser; files are never uploaded

A live planisphere: for your latitude, longitude, date and time it works out the altitude and azimuth of every bright star, the Sun, the Moon and the seven planets, and draws them with a stereographic projection as a whole-sky dome or as the view in one direction. Stars come from the public-domain Yale Bright Star Catalogue and the Sun, Moon and planets from Meeus and JPL low-precision formulas, accurate enough to find things in the real sky.

## How to use

1. Pick a city or type a latitude and longitude, or tap "Use my location"
2. Set the date and time or press Now; drag the time-of-day slider or press Play to turn the sky
3. Switch between the whole-sky dome and "Look in a direction", and drag on the chart to turn your view
4. Set the limiting magnitude to match your light pollution, then tap any star, planet or the Moon for its magnitude, position and rise, transit and set times

## Features

- 1,267 naked-eye stars down to magnitude 4.8, coloured by B−V and sized by brightness
- Lines and names for 51 major constellations, with common names for 90 bright stars
- Live positions and magnitudes for the Sun, the Moon (with phase and parallax) and Mercury to Neptune
- Rise, transit and set times for stars and planets, plus the end of astronomical dusk and start of dawn
- Whole-sky dome or a draggable directional view, with toggles for ecliptic, celestial equator and alt-az grid
- Time animation from 10 minutes to 1 day per second; at 1 sidereal day per second the stars hold still and the planets drift

## FAQ

### Why is east on the left of the sky chart?

A road map shows the ground seen from above, so with north up east is on the right. A sky chart shows the sky seen from below, which flips it: with north at the top, east is on the left. Hold the chart over your head with its top toward north and it matches the sky. In "Look in a direction" mode the picture is simply what is in front of you, so left and right feel normal.

### Why do I see fewer stars in the city than on the chart?

Artificial light brightens the sky and drowns the faint stars. The faintest magnitude you can see is the limiting magnitude: about 2–3 in a city centre, around 4 in the suburbs and 6 or fainter at a dark rural site. Set the limiting-magnitude slider to match and the chart keeps only what you can actually see. Before full darkness, "Hide faint stars in a bright sky" also removes stars lost in the twilight.

### How accurate are the planet positions and rise times?

The Sun uses the Meeus low-precision theory (about 0.01°), the Moon the main terms of Meeus chapter 47 with topocentric parallax, and the planets the JPL approximate Keplerian elements with light-time correction, so positions are typically within a degree, plenty for naked-eye or small-telescope use. Rise and set times include refraction (h₀ = −0.57° for stars and planets, −0.83° for the Sun) and usually agree with almanacs to a minute or two. Plotted positions are geometric; near the horizon refraction lifts objects by about half a degree.

### Why does a star rise about four minutes earlier each day?

Because Earth orbits the Sun, it makes one extra turn per year relative to the stars, so a sidereal day is 23 h 56 min 4 s, about four minutes shorter than a solar day. Each star rises and transits about four minutes earlier every night, two hours earlier per month, which is why the evening sky changes with the seasons. Set the animation to 1 sidereal day per second and the stars stay put while the Moon and planets move among them.

### What are the ecliptic and the celestial equator?

The celestial equator is Earth's equator projected onto the sky, declination 0; from the northern hemisphere it rises due east, crosses the southern sky and sets due west, while the celestial pole sits at an altitude equal to your latitude. The ecliptic is the Sun's yearly path among the stars, tilted about 23.4° to the equator. The Moon and planets stay close to it, so a bright "star" on the ecliptic that is not on a star map is usually a planet.

## Related tools

- [Unit Converter](https://qilingtools.com/en/math/unit): Free online unit converter: length, area, volume, weight, temperature, time, speed, data, pressure, energy and angle — one value converts every unit at once.
- [Vector Calculator](https://qilingtools.com/en/math/vector): Free online vector calculator for 2D and 3D: addition, scalar multiples, dot and cross products, magnitude, angle, unit vector and projections, with checks.
- [Significant Figures Calculator](https://qilingtools.com/en/math/significant-figures): Free online sig fig calculator: count significant figures digit by digit, round to N sig figs or decimals with six rounding modes, and compute by sig fig rules.
- [Tone Generator](https://qilingtools.com/en/audio/tone-generator): Free online tone generator: sine, square, sawtooth and triangle waves from 1 to 20,000 Hz, a note picker, sweeps, white/pink/brown noise and a WAV download.
- [Audio Spectrogram](https://qilingtools.com/en/audio/spectrogram): Free online spectrogram generator: see time, frequency and level from a Hann-windowed STFT, with FFT size, log axis, dB range and colour maps. Exports PNG.
- [Decibel Meter](https://qilingtools.com/en/audio/decibel): Free online decibel meter: measure noise with your mic in real time, A/C/Z weighting, fast/slow response, min/max/average/Leq, 60-second graph and calibration.
- [Physics Formula Calculator](https://qilingtools.com/en/physics/physics): Physics formulas solved with steps: SUVAT, projectiles, Newton’s laws, inclines, energy, Ohm’s law, resistors, RC, buoyancy, waves, lenses, gravity.
- [Fourier Series & FFT Visualizer](https://qilingtools.com/en/math/fourier): Fourier series coefficients and animated partial sums for square, sawtooth, triangle or any function (Gibbs), draw-your-own epicycles and FFT spectra.