Here’s How To See Where The ISS Is Right Now

The “Live Space Station Tracking Map” on NASA’s website is your first option. It has a solitary flight path map showing the exact location of the ISS as it travels across the planet in real-time. It also shows where the station was located 90 minutes in the past and where it is expected to be 90 minutes into the future. The map even has dark overlays that indicate where it’s night in other parts of the world. Real-time telemetry data provided by the European Space Agency includes the ISS’ latitude, longitude, altitude, and speed in either metric or imperial units of measure.

A second option is the ISS Astro Viewer. Created by Dirk Matussek, this one is interesting because it provides the same real-time ground tracking imagery and telemetry data as the NASA site, plus it shows you what the astronauts are seeing as they look down on Earth. If you’re interested in the Chinese Space Station Tiangong, you can see similar data for that station.

The third option you have in tracking the station is a tool called ISS Position, created by a private group of developers who love space. It’s the simplest of the sites providing just a single real-time image of the ISS as it moves across a global map. It can also track the Hubble Telescope, Vanguard 1 (the oldest satellite still in orbit), the NOAA weather satellite, and the Landsat 7 world imagery satellite.

With plans to decommission the ISS and replace it with a shinier model, time is running out to track its movement. As the plan at present is to send the ISS into a controlled deorbit in 2031, now’s as good a time as any!