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.
Neptune at Night
Ice giant Neptune is faint in Earth's night sky. Some 30 times farther from the Sun than our fair planet, telescopes are needed to catch a glimpse of the dim and distant world.…
Helping Hand in Cassiopeia
Drifting near the plane of our Milky Way galaxy these dusty molecular clouds seem to extend a helping hand on a cosmic scale. Part of a local complex of star-forming interstellar…
Shell Galaxies in Pisces
This spectacular intergalactic skyscape features Arp 227, a curious system of galaxies from the 1966 Atlas of Peculiar Galaxies . Some 100 million light-years distant within the…
Comet Tsuchinshan-Atlas over the Dolomites
Comet Tsuchinshan-Atlas is now headed back to the outer Solar System . The massive dusty snowball put on quite a show during its trip near the Sun, resulting in many impressive…
Milky Way over Easter Island
Why were the statues on Easter Island built? No one is sure. What is sure is that over 900 large stone statues called moai s exist there. The Rapa Nui (Easter Island) moais stand,…
M42: The Great Nebula in Orion
The Great Nebula in Orion , an immense, nearby starbirth region , is probably the most famous of all astronomical nebulas . Here, glowing gas surrounds hot young stars at the edge…
Jupiter Abyss
What's that black spot on Jupiter? No one is sure. During one pass of NASA's Juno over Jupiter , the robotic spacecraft imaged an usually dark cloud feature informally dubbed the…
Saturn at Night
Saturn is bright in Earth's night skies. Telescopic views of the outer gas giant planet and its beautiful rings often make it a star at star parties . But this stunning view of…
Spiral Galaxy NGC 6744
Big, beautiful spiral galaxy NGC 6744 is nearly 175,000 light-years across, larger than our own Milky Way . It lies some 30 million light-years distant in the southern…
Rigel and the Witch Head Nebula
By starlight, this eerie visage shines in the dark with a crooked profile evoking its popular name, the Witch Head Nebula . In fact, this entrancing telescopic portrait gives the…
NGC 7635: The Bubble Nebula
What created this huge space bubble? Blown by the wind from a star, this tantalizing , head-like apparition is cataloged as NGC 7635, but known simply as the Bubble Nebula . The…
NGC 602: Stars Versus Pillars from Webb
The stars are destroying the pillars. More specifically, some of the newly formed stars in the image center are emitting light so energetic that is evaporating the gas and dust in…
STEVE: A Glowing River over France
Sometimes a river of hot gas flows over your head. In this case the river created a Strong Thermal Emission Velocity Enhancement ( STEVE ) that glowed bright red, white, and pink.…
LDN 43: The Cosmic Bat Nebula
What is the most spook-tacular nebula in the galaxy? One contender is LDN 43, which bears an astonishing resemblance to a vast cosmic bat flying amongst the stars on a dark…
Phantoms in Cassiopeia
These brightly outlined flowing shapes look ghostly on a cosmic scale. A telescopic view toward the constellation Cassiopeia , the colorful skyscape features the swept-back,…
Globular Star Cluster NGC 6752
Some 13,000 light-years away toward the southern constellation Pavo, the globular star cluster NGC 6752 roams the halo of our Milky Way galaxy. Over 10 billion years old, NGC 6752…
NGC 7293: The Helix Nebula
A mere seven hundred light years from Earth toward the constellation Aquarius , a star is dying. The once sun-like star's last few thousand years have produced the Helix Nebula .…
Caught
What if a rocket could return to its launch tower -- and be caught? This happened for the first time 10 days ago, after a SpaceX Starship rocket blasted off from its pad in Boca…
M16: Pillars of Star Creation
These dark pillars may look destructive, but they are creating stars. This pillar-capturing picture of the Eagle Nebula combines visible light exposures taken with the Hubble…
Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS over California
The tails of Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS were a sight to behold. Pictured, C/2023 A3 (Tsuchinshan-ATLAS) was captured near peak impressiveness last week over the Eastern Sierra…
Dark Matter in a Simulated Universe
Is our universe haunted? It might look that way on this dark matter map. The gravity of unseen dark matter is the leading explanation for why galaxies rotate so fast , why…
Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS Flys Away
These six panels follow daily apparitions of comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS as it moved away from our fair planet during the past week. The images were taken with the same…
Most of Comet Tsuchinshan-ATLAS
On October 14 it was hard to capture a full view of Comet C/2023 A3 Tsuchinshan-ATLAS . Taken after the comet's closest approach to our fair planet, this evening skyview almost…
The Clipper and the Comet
NASA's Europa Clipper is now headed toward an ocean world beyond Earth. The large spacecraft is tucked into the payload fairing atop the Falcon Heavy rocket in this photo, taken…
Viewing discoveries from 9 November 2024 through 17 October 2024.