Light Pollution Map: How Dark Is the Sky Near You?
How much light is around you at night, and where the nearest darker sky is.
Denver, CO · NASA’s light at night
Among the brightest 1% of the lower 48 at nightThe darkest sky within 50 miles is 49 miles south-west, near Bailey, CO — darker than 74% of the lower 48.
- Light within 25 miles
- 24× the lower 48’s median
- Darkest within 50 mi
- 49 mi south-west
- Darkest within 100 mi
- 96 mi west
- Nearest dark-sky park
- Rocky Mountain National Park, 56 mi
darkest → brightestyour placedarkest spotsdark-sky park
Tap the map to check any spot. It covers the 50 states, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands.
Light: NASA’s Black Marble (VIIRS, VNP46A2), the median of 12 nights, June–September 2026, through NASA GIBS. Land: Natural Earth. Parks: the National Park Service, placed by Wikidata. Towns: GeoNames.
Denver is among the brightest 1% of the lower 48 at night, and the darkest sky within 50 miles is 49 miles south-west. Type any US place or tap the map: it ranks the light NASA’s satellite measured within 25 miles and finds the darkest spots within 50 and 100 miles.
How to use it
Type a town and pick it from the list, type coordinates (“39.74, -104.98”), tap Use my location, or tap the map. The answer ranks your place against the land of the lower 48 states, then points to the darkest spot within 50 miles and within 100 miles that you can reach over land, with the nearest town to it, and to the nearest of the National Park Service’s stargazing parks. Zoom the map to 100 miles around your place to see where the light stops. Plan a night at the dark spot with the Stargazing Planner, which picks the dark, moonless nights. Copy the link to share a place; your own location never goes into it.
What the map shows
The light is NASA’s Black Marble: what the VIIRS instrument on the Suomi NPP satellite measures from space at night, corrected for moonlight, with each night’s cloudy spots filled from the last clear view (NASA’s product VNP46A2). The map takes the median of 12 nights from June to September 2026, so a wildfire, a flare or a missed cloud on one night drops out, and averages it into cells a tenth of a degree across in the lower 48 and Alaska (about 7 miles north to south), finer in Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands. Water is dark.
“The light within 25 miles” adds up all the light the satellite saw on the ground in a 25-mile circle around a place and spreads it over the circle. A town next to a dark sea or desert has less light around it than the same town inland. Every place is ranked against the land of the lower 48: “brighter than 90%” means nine-tenths of the lower 48 has less light around it. The lower 48’s median, the middle of that list, is the “1×” in the answer.
Why no Bortle number
The Bortle scale grades how the sky looks to your eye, from 1 (the darkest) to 9 (an inner city). A satellite does not see the sky; it sees the light that leaves the ground going up. Turning that into a Bortle class needs a model of how light scatters in the air, and a Bortle number from a satellite map is always that model’s estimate, not a measurement. This map keeps to what NASA measured: how much light there is, where, and how your place ranks. A place in the darkest tenth here is far from any town’s light; a city center in the brightest 1% will show you the Moon, planets and a few bright stars.
The light around 14 cities
| City | Brighter than (lower 48) | Darkest within 50 miles | Darkest within 100 miles |
|---|---|---|---|
| New York City, NY | 99% | 49 mi north-west · 84% | 99 mi east · 46% |
| Los Angeles, CA | 99% | 48 mi north-west · 85% | 97 mi north-east · 38% |
| Chicago, IL | 99% | 46 mi east · 81% | 90 mi south · 51% |
| Houston, TX | 99% | 50 mi north-east · 85% | 93 mi south-west · 40% |
| Phoenix, AZ | 99% | 50 mi north-east · 39% | 99 mi east · 20% |
| Atlanta, GA | 99% | 50 mi west · 82% | 95 mi north · 53% |
| Miami, FL | 99% | 48 mi west · 33% | 74 mi south-west · 1% |
| Orlando, FL | 99% | 50 mi south · 60% | 98 mi north-west · 41% |
| Seattle, WA | 98% | 48 mi west · 2% | 94 mi west · 1% |
| Denver, CO | 99% | 49 mi south-west · 26% | 96 mi west · 16% |
| Las Vegas, NV | 99% | 47 mi north · 28% | 98 mi east · 12% |
| Nashville, TN | 98% | 48 mi south-west · 68% | 74 mi south-west · 53% |
| Honolulu, HI | 83% | 29 mi north · 61% | 29 mi north · 61% |
| Anchorage, AK | 82% | 45 mi west · 1% | 93 mi south-east · 1% |
Each spot’s percentage is its own rank: the lower it is, the darker the sky. Distances are straight lines from the city center to a spot on the same landmass.
Worked examples
Denver, Colorado. 24 times the lower 48’s median light within 25 miles puts it among the brightest 1%. The darkest sky within 50 miles is 49 miles south-west, near Bailey, CO, darker than 74% of the lower 48; within 100 miles it is 96 miles west, darker than 84%. Rocky Mountain National Park is 56 miles north-west.
Phoenix, Arizona. The metro’s light reaches far: the darkest spot within 50 miles is darker than only 61% of the lower 48. Drive 99 miles east and it is darker than 80%.
Key West, Florida. A town surrounded by sea: darker at night than 68% of the lower 48, and the darkest spot within 50 miles, 28 miles east along the Keys, is darker than 83%.
Moab, Utah. Darker than 78% of the lower 48, with Arches National Park 11 miles north; within 100 miles the darkest spot is darker than 96%.
Common mistakes
- Driving to the first dark patch. A spot just past the suburbs still has the city’s glow over it. The darkest spot within 50 or 100 miles counts all the light within 25 miles of it, so it sits away from towns.
- Forgetting the Moon and the clouds. The map is the ground’s light. A full moon or a cloudy night hides the stars anywhere; pick a moonless night in the Stargazing Planner.
- Trusting a dot on a map for access. A dark spot may be private land, a closed road or a steep canyon. Use it to pick an area, then find a public place to stop there, like a park, a campground or a pullout.
- Facing the nearest town. Even in a dark place, a town on the horizon lights that part of the sky. Face away from it.
Plan the trip
Read our guide to dark sky parks in the US, which state has the darkest sky parks, the states where you can see the Milky Way, Florida’s darkest spots and the darkest skies on Earth. Then pick the night with the Stargazing Planner, check the northern lights forecast and price the parks with the National Parks Pass Calculator.
FAQ
What is a light pollution map?
A map of how much artificial light there is at night. This one shows NASA’s satellite measurements of the light on the ground, the median of 12 nights in the summer of 2026, and ranks any US place against the lower 48.
What Bortle class am I in?
A satellite cannot measure it: the Bortle scale grades the sky as your eye sees it, and a Bortle class on a satellite map is a model’s estimate. This map ranks the measured light instead; a place in the darkest tenth of the lower 48 is far from any town’s light.
Where is the darkest sky near me?
Type your town or tap Use my location: the map finds the darkest spot within 50 miles and within 100 miles that you can reach over land, with the nearest town, and the nearest National Park Service stargazing park.
How far from a city do I need to go to see the stars?
It depends on the city and the direction. From Denver the darkest sky within 50 miles is darker than 74% of the lower 48; from Phoenix only 61% — its light reaches farther. The table above shows 14 cities.
How up to date is the map?
It is built from 12 nights between June 2 and September 27, 2026. Lights change slowly, but new towns, roads and LED streetlights do show up; the map is rebuilt from NASA’s newest nights each year.
Why is my town bright when my street is dark?
The number is the light within 25 miles, not on your street: a quiet street near a lit town has the town’s glow in its sky. Tap the map a few miles out to see how fast the light falls away.