Meteor shower tonight and the next one
Which meteor showers are active tonight, when the next peak is, what the Moon will be doing and how to watch.
Next peak
Orionids
21 Oct 2026 · 09:25 UTC
ZHR
20
Moon at the peak
poor (bright moon)
75%
Active now
| Peak | ZHR | Moon at the peak | Activity period | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Orionids | 21 Oct 2026 09:25 UTC | 20 | poor (bright moon) | 02 Oct 2026 – 07 Nov 2026 |
| Southern Taurids | 05 Nov 2026 09:58 UTC | 5 | excellent (little moonlight) | 10 Sept 2026 – 20 Nov 2026 |
How to watch
- Find the darkest sky you can reach and give your eyes 20 minutes to adapt, with no screens.
- Watch a wide patch of sky about 40° away from the radiant, not the radiant itself.
- The best hours are after midnight, when the radiant climbs higher and the Earth is ploughing head-on into the stream.
- No telescope or binoculars needed: the naked-eye field of view is the right tool.
ZHR is the number of meteors an hour you would see with the radiant overhead, under a perfectly dark sky and no moon. From a city, expect a fraction of that.
See also
How these times are calculated
Each shower’s parameters (solar longitude of the peak, activity period, radiant, speed and ZHR) come from the IMO Working List of Visual Meteor Showers. The peak date and time are not stored: they are computed year by year by solving for the instant when the Sun’s ecliptic longitude reaches the peak value, using the same solar series as the sunrise pages. For sharply peaked showers such as the Quadrantids, the IMO publishes year-specific predictions that can differ by a few hours.
- IMO — International Meteor Organization, Working List of Visual Meteor Showers — imo.net