Milky Way Tonight

Photographing the Milky Way takes a lot of planning. This app makes it easy.

Open the app and the first thing you see is Tonight at a Glance: a plain-language summary of whether tonight is worth going out. It tells you when the Galactic Core rises and peaks, when the moon sets, what the cloud cover looks like, and how dark your skies are on the Bortle scale.
If tonight is a bust, it tells you the next clear window so you can start planning ahead.

Below that is a 7-day forecast strip that color-codes each night by visibility quality and highlights the best opportunity in the week. Tap any day for a full breakdown.

When you're ready to find a location, the Dark Sky Finder searches for darker skies near you, ranked by light pollution, cloud cover, and driving distance together. You're not just finding dark spots on a map, you're finding the best realistic option for tonight.

The Composition Planner lets you visualize where the Milky Way arc will be positioned relative to a location before you ever leave home. See the galactic core position, plan your foreground, and show up knowing exactly what shot you're going for.

Sky View not only opens a star map using your phone's compass, but with access to your camera the AR mode allows for real-time planning. Point it at the sky, the horizon or directly at your foreground to see exactly where and when the stars align over your composition. It's a powerful tool for scouting compositions in the field and knowing exactly when you need to be shooting.

Core Alignment: While using Sky View, tap anywhere on screen to see exactly when the Milky Way Core will align above that foreground; the next time and for the rest of the season. The ultimate composition planner.

H-Alpha boost mode shifts the overlay to highlight nebula and emission regions. Perfect for astro modified cameras.

The visibility calendar is your personal Milky Way calendar, built off your exact location. It maps out every night of the year so you can plan shoots weeks or months in advance. Save any night to My MW Nights to add notes, see the sky conditions, and keep all your plans in one place.

The NPF calculator helps you dial in the sharpest possible stars for your specific camera and lens combination, so you know the longest exposure you can shoot without trailing.

When you're in the field, Dark Adaptation Mode tints and dims your screen red so your night vision stays intact.

For anyone new to this type of photography, the Getting Started guide walks through the entire workflow from scratch, including how to read the data in the app, what gear settings to use, and how to actually find the Milky Way once you're in the field.

Built by landscape astrophotographer Jack Fusco (@jackfusco).

FEATURES
- Tonight at a Glance: galactic core rise, peak, and window times for your location. Full nightly and core specific cloud forecasts
- Nightly quality ratings: Excellent, Good, Brief, Limited, and Blocked with plain-language explanations
- Next clear window: see exactly how many nights until conditions improve
- 7-day Milky Way and cloud forecast strip
- Dark Sky Finder: ranked by light pollution, cloud cover, and driving distance
Bortle class and SQM ratings for any location
- Composition Planner: visualize the galactic arc over your planned foreground
- Sky View AR: live star map with camera overlay using your phone's compass
- Monthly visibility calendar built from your exact location
- Core Alignment - See exactly when the MW will line up over any foreground.
- My MW Nights: save shooting nights with notes and sky data
- NPF calculator: find the sharpest exposure time for your camera and lens
- Dark Adaptation Mode: red screen tint to protect your night vision in the field
- Offline support: cached forecast data available without a connection
- Getting Started guide written for complete beginners

No account required, no ads, no tracking

Recent changes:
- Planning & Organizing Update -
- Added larger view of planning and location maps.
- Saved nights and locations can now be given custom names.
- Recent location searches appear in a dropdown and Saved locations are better organized.
- 18 new cameras in the exposure calculator
- Accuracy improvements throughout.
- Improved MW AR View visuals
If you experience any issues or have any suggestions, please reach out directly - info@themilkywaytonight.com