Browse NASA Astronomy Picture of the Day archive by date and media: Archive Discoveries
Browse the NASA APOD archive without needing the exact date first. Filter by media type and keep moving deeper into older images and videos.
Phases of the Moon
Look at the Moon every night and its visible sunlit portion gradually changes. In phases progressing from New Moon to Full Moon to New Moon again, a lunar cycle or lunation is…
Horsehead: A Wider View
Combined image data from the massive, ground-based VISTA telescope and the Hubble Space Telescope was used to create this wide perspective of the interstellar landscape…
Cyclones at Jupiter's North Pole
Juno's Jovian Infrared Auroral Mapper data was used to construct this stunning view of cyclones at Jupiter's North Pole . Measuring the thermal emission from Jovian cloud tops,…
Arcs, Jets, and Shocks near NGC 1999
This tantalizing array of nebulas and stars can be found about two degrees south of the famous star-forming Orion Nebula. The region abounds with energetic young stars producing…
Colorful Airglow Bands Surround Milky Way
Why would the sky glow like a giant repeating rainbow? Airglow . Now air glows all of the time, but it is usually hard to see. A disturbance however -- like an approaching storm…
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The Hubble Ultra-Deep Field in Light and Sound
Have you heard about the Hubble Ultra-Deep Field? Either way, you've likely not heard about it like this -- please run your pointer over the featured image and listen! The Hubble…
Clouds, Birds, Moon, Venus
Sometimes the sky above can become quite a show. In early September of 2010, for example, the Moon and Venus converged , creating quite a sight by itself for sky enthusiasts…
Southwest Mare Fecunditatis
Frank Borman, James Lovell, and William Anders journeyed from Earth to the Moon and back again in December of 1968. From lunar orbit , their view of craters in southwest Mare…
Alborz Mountain Star Trails
Colourful star trails arc through the night in this wide-angle mountain and skyscape. From a rotating planet , the digitally added consecutive exposures were made with a camera…
The Lunar X (V)
The striking X in this lunarscape is easily visible in binoculars or a small telescope, but not too many have seen it. The catch is, this lunar X is fleeting and only apparent in…
NGC 613 in Dust, Stars, and a Supernova
Where did that spot come from? Amateur astronomer Victor Buso was testing out a new camera on his telescope in 2016 when he noticed a curious spot of light appear -- and remain.…
Dueling Bands in the Night
What are these two bands in the sky? The more commonly seen band is the one on the right and is the central band of our Milky Way galaxy . Our Sun orbits in the disk of this…
Passing Jupiter
Here comes Jupiter! NASA's robotic spacecraft Juno is continuing on its 53-day, highly-elongated orbits around our Solar System's largest planet. The featured video is from…
AE Aurigae and the Flaming Star Nebula
Why is AE Aurigae called the flaming star? For one reason, the surrounding nebula IC 405 is named the Flaming Star Nebula because the region seems to harbor smoke, even though…
Facing NGC 6946
From our vantage point in the Milky Way Galaxy , we see NGC 6946 face-on . The big, beautiful spiral galaxy is located just 20 million light-years away, behind a veil of…
Apollo 17: A Stereo View from Lunar Orbit
Get out your red/blue glasses and check out this awesome stereo view of another world. The scene was recorded by Apollo 17 mission commander Eugene Cernan on December 11, 1972,…
When Roses Aren't Red
Not all roses are red of course , but they can still be very pretty. Likewise, the beautiful Rosette Nebula and other star forming regions are often shown in astronomical images…
Jupiter in Infrared from Hubble
Jupiter looks a bit different in infrared light. To better understand Jupiter 's cloud motions and to help NASA's robotic Juno spacecraft understand the planetary context of the…
A Partial Solar Eclipse over Buenos Aires
What's happened to top of the Sun? Last week, parts of Earth's southern hemisphere were treated to a partial solar eclipse , where the Moon blocks out part of the Sun . The…
Galaxy Formation in a Magnetic Universe
How did we get here? We know that we live on a planet orbiting a star orbiting a galaxy, but how did all of this form? To understand details better, astrophysicists upgraded the…
LL Ori and the Orion Nebula
Stars can make waves in the Orion Nebula's sea of gas and dust. This esthetic close-up of cosmic clouds and stellar winds features LL Orionis , interacting with the Orion Nebula…
Manhattan Skylines
City lights shine along the upper east side of Manahattan in this dramatic urban night skyscape from February 13. Composed from a series of digital exposures, the monochrome image…
Comet PanSTARRS is near the Edge
The comet PanSTARRS also known as the blue comet (C/2016 R2) really is near the lower left edge of this stunning, wide field view recorded on January 13. Spanning nearly 20…
Enceladus in Silhouette
One of our Solar System's most tantalizing worlds, Enceladus is backlit by the Sun in this Cassini spacecraft image from November 1, 2009. The dramatic illumination reveals the…
Viewing discoveries from 10 March 2018 through 15 February 2018.