ISS Spotting

NASA has released a new interactive map which makes it much easier to spot the International Space Station as it orbits the Earth. The map can tell you the best times to see the ISS, where you need to look and how long it will be visible.

Share your location with the Spot the Station map and you can view details on the best dates and times to view the ISS. The map also tells you where to look in the sky and the length of time that the space station will be visible.

You can also view these details on Astro Viewer, a real-time Google Map tracking the position of the ISS. Astro Viewer not only allows you to view the current position of the ISS on a map but also allows you to view a list of the next sighting opportunities for your location, with a visibility indicator that predicts the brightness of the ISS on its pass.


If you get tired of looking up at the sky then you might want to check out the view from the International Space Station as it looks down on Earth. The ISS HD Earth Viewing Experiment provides a live video stream of Earth that is broadcast from the ISS.

Since this video broadcast went live there have been a number of applications released which have embedded the USTREAM video on top of maps showing the current location of the ISS above the Earth.

One of the best maps of the ISS HD Earth Viewing Experiment is ISS Live, a beautiful WebGL Earth visualization showing the position of the International Space Station alongside ISS's live view of the Earth.

Another interesting map of the live video stream and the position of the ISS is radioISS. This map allows you to view the ISS HD Earth Viewing video while listening to radio stations from around the world. As the International Space Station travels around the Earth radioISS automatically tunes into radio stations from the country that the ISS is currently flying over (or from countries nearby).