About SnapCosmos

Why SnapCosmos exists

Most stargazing apps bury the one thing you actually want to know — is tonight worth going outside?— under menus, ads, account walls and dashboards designed for professionals. SnapCosmos exists to answer that single question, in one glance, for any location on Earth, with no login and no clutter.

It combines a full astronomical ephemeris (Sun, Moon, planets, twilight), live weather (clouds, humidity, visibility), Moon interference and true darkness into a single 0–100 score, then explains — in plain English — what you can actually see and when to step outside for the best view.

Who makes it

SnapCosmos is built and maintained by The Snap Cosmos Team, a small group of amateur astronomers based in Norway. It's an independent project — no venture capital, no ad network, no data sales, no outside editorial board.

The project grew out of years of frustration with existing tools that either buried the answer under menus or demanded an account before showing anything useful. If you have feedback, corrections, or you spot something wrong, please reach out — this is a small enough project that every email gets a personal reply.

Contact: snapcosmosplus@gmail.com

How SnapCosmos is made

Everything you see is computed in your browser. Astronomical positions come from astronomy-engine — the same high-precision ephemeris library used by professional planetariums. Weather comes from Open-Meteo, space weather from NOAA SWPC, and ISS pass predictions from public TLE data. Full endpoint list, refresh cadence and accuracy caveats live on the Data Sources page.

Your location and preferences are stored in your browser only. SnapCosmos has no accounts, no user database, no server-side profiling and no third-party analytics.

Editorial principles

• Honest forecasts. No oversold "comet of the century." If tonight is poor, we say so.
• One clear answer first. The technical detail is available for those who want it — but never in the way of the answer.
• Ad-free, tracker-free, private. No ads, no third-party analytics, no accounts.
• Global by default. Every calculation works for any point on Earth, in your local time and units.
• Beautiful enough to open every night. A tool you keep using is a tool that improves your life.

Read the full editorial policy for corrections, sources and conflict-of-interest disclosure.