If you enjoy taking pictures of the Milky Way at night, I strongly advise you to download these Milky Way apps to make this task easier.
Many of the apps listed below have free plans available, so you can use them without spending a penny. They will help you in spotting the perfect location, weather, day of the month and time of day to help you take marvelous photos of stars.
With these apps, you won’t need to use an astrophotography telescope now to capture constellations.
Top 11 Best Milky Way Apps
- Dark Sky Finder - Our choice - iOS | Android
- Star Walk 2 - Perfect for finding celestial bodies - iOS | Android
- Celestron’s SkyPortal - For aspiring astrophotographers iOS | Android
- Weather Underground - For accurate weather forecasts - iOS | Android
- Go Sky Watch - For identifying stars - iOS | Android
- Deluxe Moon - A moon calendar app - iOS | Android
- Sol: Sun Clock - Sun Clock app - iOS | Android
- Clear Outside - For weather forecasts - iOS | Android
- TPE – The Photographer’s Ephemeris - For amateur photographers - iOS | Android
- PhotoPills – For planning locations - iOS | Android
- Dark Sky Weather - The best weather app - iOS
Only some of the apps listed below can be used for photo editing, so it’s strongly recommended to use pro-level astrophotography software.
1. Dark Sky Finder
- Map of light pollution
- Information on temperature
- Cloud cover map
- Aurora map
- Astronomical calculators
- Lots of paid features
Verdict: One of the most essential issues in astrophotography is light pollution. With the help of this Milky Way app you can find the darkest skies nearby. Users can mark their favorite locations on the maps and add detailed descriptions. With the Dark Sky Finder app, you can always find a new destination to take pictures of the Milky Way.
Dark Sky Finder makes it easy to spot the areas with the clearest night sky possible, which allows observing celestial bodies and taking stunning photos.
The application also comes with the supermoon, lunar eclipse and meteor shower alerts, a live aurora map, information on magnetic fields, an ISS tracker, etc. This light pollution app will assist you in taking great night sky photos.
2. Star Walk 2
- A real-time sky map
- Allows seeing deep-sky celestial bodies
- Augmented reality support
- Information about celestial events and bodies
- Lots of ads in the free version
Verdict: With the help of the Star Walk 2 application, you can observe planets, stars, constellations, satellites, comets and other celestial bodies in real time. The only thing you need to do is point your smartphone to the sky.
Star Walk 2 is perfect for watching stars. This Milky Way finder app shows celestial bodies in the sky together with their location. Additionally, it displays dates and times to let you know where and when to look at the sky. Sky Walk 2 also takes into account your location and has handy augmented reality options.
3. Celestron’s SkyPortal
- Compatible with Celestron devices
- The Night Vision feature
- Telescope control
- A compass mode
- A limited number of features in the free version
Verdict: With the Celestron SkyPortal app, you can explore the Solar System, observe 120,000 stars, galaxies, dozens of asteroids and comets, more than 200 star clusters, satellites and the ISS.
This is possible thanks to the extensive database of constellations and celestial bodies, where you can find text and audio data. For instance, if you are interested in the Pleiades, you can get the scientific information about this star cluster.
This Milky Way app has been created for beginner astronomers who use Celestron telescopes. It allows you to control Celestron devices remotely via Wi-Fi. You can also synchronize your telescope with this app.
4. Weather Underground
- Provides precise weather data
- Interactive radar maps
- Detailed hourly forecasts
- Customizable settings
- The widget does not always work
Verdict: The Weather Underground app provides the most accurate local weather forecasts, interactive radar data, satellite maps and severe weather alerts. Thanks to real-time user reports, the app receives reliable weather data for any specific region.
The Milky Way app allows you to customize notifications depending on the weather. For example, you can configure it to send you rain notifications.
5. Go Sky Watch
- The database of over 100,000 stars
- 88 Western constellations
- The Solar System’s planets
- Hand-painted artwork
- Occasionally crashes
- The free version doesn’t have many features
Verdict: Go Sky Watch is a convenient educational app for sky viewing. It displays stars, constellations, planets and makes it easier to spot them in the sky.
This Milky Way app is great for observing stars, for example, Polaris. With it, you can quickly find constellations and planets. The only thing you need to do is aim your device to the sky.
You can identify stars, planets and constellations above your head in real time and capture photos with your camera.
6. Deluxe Moon
- Moon brightness diagram
- Moon calendar and compass
- Apogee and perigee table
- Equinox and solstice table
- Occasionally crashes
Verdict: Deluxe Moon is a stylish cutting-edge app that provides you with accurate information on the Moon. This astrophotography app has a multifunctional user interface with a great number of unique features.
Deluxe Moon comes with extensive information about the Moon. It provides you with gardening advice based on the current Moon phase, animated Zodiac circles, lunar horoscope and calendar, lunar days descriptions, sunrise and sunset times.
7. Sol: Sun Clock
- Reminders and alarms
- Automatic location detection
- Extra alerts
- Golden and Blue hours for photographers
- GPS drains the battery
- Alarm does not go off in the quiet mode
Verdict: The Sol: Sun Clock app comes with a sundial-inspired design and a wide array of sunlight calculators. You can use it to plan your day, determine the optimal light level for outdoor photography, optimize your sleeping schedule, choose the best time for exercise.
This Milky Way app displays accurate information on light phases depending on your location. Sun Clock informs you about the golden hour, full darkness and astronomical twilight times.
8. Clear Outside
- 7-day hourly forecasts
- The Moon’s rising and setting times
- Information from the ISS
- Civil, nautical and astronomical darkness
- Location is not always precise
- Sometimes information is inaccurate
Verdict: This app provides hourly updated seven-day weather forecasts. It also has a table of cloudiness. Additionally, it displays information about civil, astronomical and nautical darkness. Being one of the best night photography apps, it shows times of the sun’s rising, passage and setting, rising and setting of the Moon and its phase.
You can also save your favorite locations to access them quickly. The app automatically creates a forecast for your current location.
Besides, it provides information on the ISS and helpful forecasts for solar photography.
9. The Photographer’s Ephemeris
- Moon phases and lunar illumination percentage
- Data visualizations on the map
- Offline topographic map
- Light pollution overlay map
- Doesn’t display locations outside the 80° latitude
Verdict: The Photographer’s Ephemeris is a sun and moon calculator that helps choose the best time for outdoor photography. It allows you to understand how light falls on the earth, regardless of your location or the time of day. This app provides you with everything you might need for Moon or Sun photography.
It is especially useful for nature photographers. Thanks to its map-based approach, you can search for any location on the planet and then put a pin on the map.
This Milky Way photography app comes with advanced features for automatic time zone recognition, atmospheric refraction correction and finding an altitude.
10. PhotoPills
- Augmented 3D reality
- Features for determining a location
- 2D planner
- Calculators and widgets
- Compass calibration sometimes fails
Verdict: PhotoPills has many tools that can be used to plan photo shoots and pick a good lens for astrophotography, etc.
PhotoPills helps you adjust composition before taking photos. By using its 3D augmented reality tools, this app will show you if the Milky Way, the Moon and the Sun are in the right position before you press the shutter.
The PhotoPills app also has a built-in timer and an extensive set of features for calculating hyperfocal distance, depth of field, the field of view, as well as matching focal lens and taking photos of star trails.
11. Dark Sky Weather
- Stunning weather animations
- Synchronization with Apple Watch
- Time Machine feature
- Widget for every day
- Information might be inaccurate
Verdict: The Dark Sky Weather app helps you keep up with the latest forecasts and plan your schedule accordingly. This app for night sky photography has its own weather service.
Dark Sky is the source of the most accurate hyper-local weather information. With its help, you can easily plan your life, as let you know when the rain is coming. Thanks to its advanced functionality, you can easily plan your astrophotography shoots.
