Geminid meteor shower
The sky on the Geminids' peak night from 40° north, at the hour their radiant near Castor, in Gemini stands highest, the view turned to it and ringed. Geminids can flash anywhere across that sky; traced backward, every one of them points to the ring.
Under this, worked out as the page is served: the Geminids' coming peak night and how much of the Moon is lit then, whether they're active now, the hour their radiant is highest, and their peaks in the years after. At best they give about 150 an hour; their source is 3200 Phaethon.
Geminids 2026
- Peakthe night of 13–14 Dec 2026, at up to 150 meteors an hour under a dark sky with the radiant overhead
- Moon22% lit at the peak (waxing crescent): little moonlight in the way
- Nownot active yet: it starts around 4 Dec
- Radianthighest around 2 AM by the Sun’s clock (an hour later in summer time), 83° up from 40° north
- Next years14 Dec 2027 (Moon 99% lit), 13 Dec 2028 (Moon 7% lit)
Peaks from the Sun’s position at each (the International Meteor Organization’s calendar), worked out with astronomy-engine as this page was served.
How to read it
The Geminids are the year’s richest shower, around 150 an hour under a dark sky at their peak, and one of the few whose parent is not a comet: 3200 Phaethon, a 5 km rocky body that swings closer to the Sun than Mercury every 1.4 years. Its grains are denser than a comet’s, so they come in slower, at 35 km a second, and burn longer, many of them bright and yellowish.
The shower has grown since it was first noticed in the 1860s. The radiant, beside Castor, rises in early evening, so meteors begin soon after dark, unlike most showers; it is highest around 2 AM, when rates are greatest. Southern observers see the shower too, if later in the night and at lower rates, the radiant staying low in their north.
Questions
What time do the Geminids start?
Soon after dark: Gemini is up in the east by about 9 PM, so the Geminids are the one major shower worth watching in the evening. The best hours are still from midnight to about 3 AM, when the radiant stands highest.
Why do Geminids look slower than other meteors?
They are slower. Phaethon’s orbit meets the Earth from the side rather than head-on, so its grains hit the air at about half the speed of the Perseids. Slow meteors last longer and are easier to follow, which makes them good for first-timers and photographers.
Can I see the Geminids from Australia?
Yes, though fewer: Gemini only climbs to about 25° above the northern horizon from Sydney, so rates there are perhaps a third of those in the north, and best from about midnight to 2 AM, when the radiant is at its highest.
Sources
The same view as a link: livex.earth/?clouds=0&radar=0&imerg=0&sats=off&launches=0&aurora=0&storms=0&severe=0&fires=0&quakes=0&lightning=0&events=0&snow=0&tsunami=0&view=sky&lat=40&shower=geminids
Drag to look around, scroll to zoom. Settings live in the URL, so any view can be shared.
view | fixed · sunrel · orbit · moon · track |
track | what to follow: iss, tiangong, satgus (Mark Rober's Space Selfie satellite), launch, sunrise, moonrise |
lat, lon | viewer position (fixed) or offset from the subsolar point (sunrel) |
period, inc | orbit period (hours) and inclination (°) |
dist | viewer distance in Earth radii; 0 = orthographic |
mag, rot | size and rotation (°) |
wait | seconds between redraws (default 60) |
time, speed | ISO start time; clock multiplier |
clouds, lights, grid, markers, label | 0 or 1 |
borders | Country borders (Natural Earth), the disputed and undefined ones dashed, and once zoomed in, the countries’ names and the states’ and provinces’ lines, off by default (key B) |
terminator | The day–night line (Sun on the horizon), with the twilight band’s edges dashed: the Sun 6° up and 6° down, off by default (key Z) |
stars | 1, 0, or photo (dimmed like a camera exposed for sunlit Earth) |
sats | all (Starlink + named), featured, or 0 |
aurora, storms, fires, quakes | 0 hides that layer (keys A H F E) |
buoys, buoy | Buoys on the globe, off by default (key Shift+B); buoy=46026 opens that buoy’s window. Click a buoy to open it. |
meteors | The last day’s meteors (Global Meteor Network), recent fireballs and the coming close approaches (NASA/JPL), off by default (key Shift+M) |
iono | Ionosphere wash: tec electron content (GloTEC), drap HF radio absorption (D-RAP), or 0 (key Shift+I) |
lightning, events, snow | lightning, GDACS floods/wildfires/eruptions with NASA's flood map and USGS's US volcano alert levels, snow and ice (keys L D I) |
sst | Sea temperature: temp, anomaly (El Niño, marine heatwaves; 1 means this), or 0 (key O) |
lst | Land surface temperature (VIIRS, MODIS): auto the afternoon’s by day and the night’s by night (1 means this), day, night, or 0 (key Shift+K) |
soil | Soil moisture (SMAP L4): surface the top 5 cm (1 means this), root the root zone to 1 m, or 0 (key Shift+W) |
chl | Chlorophyll-a (MODIS Aqua, Terra), the last eight days: 1 or 0 (key Shift+O; off by default) |
aerosol | Aerosols: aod VIIRS optical depth (1 means this), index the OMPS UV aerosol index, smoke and dust, or 0 (key Shift+Y; off by default) |
waves, wavesrc | Wave height and direction (NOAA GFS-Wave, WAVEWATCH III) as trails that travel with the waves, coloured by height: 1 or 0 (off by default); folder holding its latest.json |
currents, currentsrc | Ocean surface currents (NASA OSCAR, a daily mean, two or three days behind) as trails carried by them, coloured by speed: 1 or 0 (off by default; key Q cycles waves → currents → both → off); folder holding its latest.json |
coral, coralsrc | Coral bleaching heat stress (NOAA Coral Reef Watch degree heating weeks), drawn within 35° of the equator: 1 or 0 (key Shift+R; off by default); folder holding its latest.json |
ash | volcanic ash: EUMETSAT's Ash RGB, and GDACS's eruptions in a window (key Shift+A; off by default) |
radar, smoke, tsunami | RainViewer radar, NOAA HMS smoke, NOAA tsunami alerts (keys R Y Shift+T) |
imagery | live GOES and MTG pictures by day, daily yesterday’s VIIRS when zoomed in, painted neither; with live or daily, the newest night’s lights when zoomed in (key Shift+P; the older truecolor=0/1 still works) |
severe | Severe weather: NWS warning polygons and the SPC day-1 outlook (US), MeteoAlarm's warnings (Europe) (key X) |
imerg | With the radar, satellite rain where there’s no radar: EUMETSAT H SAF (MTG) over Europe and Africa, NASA IMERG elsewhere (R’s middle step turns it off) |
relief | terrain lit by the real Sun, from NOAA ETOPO 2022 (key Shift+E); 0 shows NASA's fixed shaded relief |
reliefscale | terrain relief strength, 0.1–5 (default 1) |
isslive | NASA ISS telemetry panel: track (while tracking the ISS), 1 (always) or 0 (key Shift+L) |
isscam | 1 opens the camera in the ISS telemetry: the station from 120 m above, its solar arrays posed from the live telemetry, and the Earth below (the wheel zooms it, 30–120°) |
firehours | show fires detected within this many hours, 1–24 (default 12) |
launches | 0 hides launch mode (key U) |
bodies, bodyscale | Sun and Moon on/off; enlarge their discs (1 = true size) |
fps | 1 shows the frame-rate display (key ~) |
feeds | 1 shows the data-feeds dashboard: each source's last update and next check (key Shift+U) |
cloudsrc, satsrc | folders holding each latest.json |
