Canary Islands · 28.27°N 16.64°W · 2150 m
Stargazing in Teide, Tenerife
A dark, high plateau you can drive to in an hour from a beach hotel.
- Sky quality
- Bortle 3 — rural sky
- Clear nights a year
- ≈ 144
- Best month overall
- July
- Milky Way core
- February–October
The Milky Way is obvious and detailed overhead, and most Messier objects are visible in binoculars.
Key facts
- Sky quality
- Bortle 3 — rural skyBortle class 3
- Average clear nights
- 144 per yearNights averaging under 30% cloud, 10-year ERA5 record
- Best Milky Way season
- February–OctoberPeak month: July, core reaching 33°
- Darkness quality
- Excellent10.6 h of astronomical darkness at its darkest, in December
- Typical cloud cover in July
- 19%75% of nights come in under 30% cloud
- Best month for astrophotography
- JulyAbout 14.9 dark, moon-free, statistically clear nights
- Coordinates
- 28.2745, -16.64122150 m elevation · Atlantic/Canary
Questions answered on this page
- Is tonight good for stargazing in Teide, Tenerife?
- Is the Milky Way visible from Teide, Tenerife?
- How many clear nights does Teide, Tenerife get each year?
- What is the best month for astrophotography in Teide, Tenerife?
- How many hours of true darkness does Teide, Tenerife get each month?
- How dark is the sky in Teide, Tenerife on the Bortle scale?
- When is the Milky Way core above the horizon from Teide, Tenerife?
- Should I drive somewhere darker than Teide, Tenerife?
Teide National Park puts you at 2,100 m on a volcanic plateau, above the same trade-wind inversion that makes La Palma so good. The Izaña Observatory sits on the ridge, and the sky over the caldera is dark enough that the Milky Way core is an obvious, structured band from March to October.
Accessibility is the selling point: this is the easiest world-class sky in Europe to reach on a normal holiday. Nights are cold at altitude even in summer, and the park has rules about overnight access — check current regulations before planning a session.
Evergreen intelligence
The four questions people ask about Teide, Tenerife
Computed from 10 years of ERA5 reanalysis at these coordinates and a full year of Sun and Moon geometry — not copied from anywhere.
- How many clear nights does Teide, Tenerife have?
- About 144 nights a year average less than 30% cloud cover, based on 10 years of ERA5 daily reanalysis at 28.27, -16.64. The clearest month is July at 75% of nights; when you also require darkness and no Moon, roughly 99 nights a year are genuinely usable for faint targets.
- What is the best month for the Milky Way in Teide, Tenerife?
- July. The galactic centre clears 10° from February to October, and in July it reaches 33° while the sky is astronomically dark, with about 5.5 hours of usable core time a night and 75% of nights averaging under 30% cloud.
- When is it darkest in Teide, Tenerife?
- December gives the most true darkness — an average of 10.6 hours a night with the Sun more than 18° below the horizon.
- When should I plan an astrophotography trip to Teide, Tenerife?
- July offers the most nights that are simultaneously dark, moon-free and statistically clear — about 14.9 of them. Book around the new Moon in that month and keep two spare nights; a single fixed date at any location is a coin toss.
Darkness calendar
Teide, Tenerife month by month
Astronomical darkness and Moon geometry are computed for these coordinates. Cloud figures are ten-year ERA5 daily means. Rating combines darkness, moon-free nights and clear-sky odds.
| Month | Astro darkness | Moon-free dark nights | Avg cloud | Clear nights | Milky Way core | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Jan | 10.5 h | 22 | 52% | 29% | — | Workable |
| Feb | 10.0 h | 21 | 51% | 30% | 18° max | Workable |
| Mar | 9.3 h | 21 | 49% | 31% | 28° max | Workable |
| Apr | 8.4 h | 20 | 49% | 27% | 33° max | Workable |
| May | 7.5 h | 21 | 40% | 42% | 33° max | Good |
| Jun | 6.6 h | 21 | 26% | 62% | 33° max | Excellent |
| Jul | 7.2 h | 20 | 19% | 75% | 33° max | Excellent |
| Aug | 8.0 h | 20 | 26% | 65% | 33° max | Excellent |
| Sep | 8.8 h | 20 | 41% | 43% | 30° max | Good |
| Oct | 9.9 h | 22 | 52% | 26% | 20° max | Workable |
| Nov | 10.4 h | 24 | 61% | 15% | — | Poor |
| Dec | 10.6 h | 24 | 54% | 26% | — | Workable |
"Moon-free dark nights" counts nights with at least two hours of astronomical darkness during which the Moon stays below the horizon. "Clear nights" is the share of days in the ERA5 record averaging under 30% cloud cover.
Practical
What Teide, Tenerife is actually good for
- Milky Way over the caldera
- Accessible high-altitude sky
- Winter deep-sky
For a decision on a specific night rather than a season, the SnapCosmos Night Engine scores tonight and the next six nights from these coordinates — . The method, weighting and known limits are documented on the Night Engine page, and its measured accuracy is published here.
FAQ
Common questions about the sky in Teide, Tenerife
- Can you see the Milky Way in Teide, Tenerife?
- Yes. Teide, Tenerife sits at Bortle 3 — rural sky, where the Milky Way is an obvious, structured band whenever the galactic centre is above the horizon and the Moon is down.
- When is the best time of year to stargaze in Teide, Tenerife?
- It depends on what you want to see, and the month-by-month table on this page ranks every month by hours of astronomical darkness, moon-free nights and ten years of cloud statistics for these exact coordinates.
- How dark does it get in Teide, Tenerife?
- Teide, Tenerife is at latitude 28.3°N, and this page computes the hours of true astronomical darkness — Sun more than 18° below the horizon — for every month of the year at that latitude.
- Is tonight a good night in Teide, Tenerife?
- The SnapCosmos Night Engine scores tonight for these coordinates against the coming week using live cloud forecasts, Moon geometry and darkness, and returns a single go, wait or skip recommendation.
Where these numbers come from
- Ten-year cloud-cover climatology and historical night rankingERA5 reanalysisECMWF / Copernicus Climate Change Service
- Hourly cloud cover, precipitation, humidity and visibility forecastsOpen-Meteo forecast and archive APIOpen-Meteo
- Sun, Moon and planet positions, rise and set times, twilight phasesAstronomy Engine (VSOP87 / ELP2000 series)Don Cross, after the IMCCE and JPL analytical theories
- Bortle class and sky-brightness context for each locationWorld Atlas of Artificial Night Sky Brightness (Falchi et al., 2016)Science Advances / Light Pollution Map
- Definitions of civil, nautical and astronomical twilight, and lunar phase conventionsAstronomical Applications DepartmentUnited States Naval Observatory
Figures on this page last recomputed .
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