The Solar Observatory

The Sun, monitored.

The star's face as SDO sees it right now, and the instruments the world's forecasters read — flare class, solar wind, the aurora outlook.

SDO

Today’s star

NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory · refreshed continuously

The Sun today — Corona · 193 Å — Corona · 193 Å
Hot coronal loops and coronal holes — the Sun most forecasters watch.

The Sun today — Chromosphere · 304 Å — Chromosphere · 304 Å
Filaments and prominences — the eruptions in profile.

The Sun today — Visible · HMI — Visible · HMI
The photosphere as an eye would see it, sunspots and all.

LIVE

The instruments

X-ray flux · flare class

C1.2

small flares — common, little effect at Earth · GOES, 23:26 UTC

Solar wind at L1

356 km/s

Ordinary breeze from the corona · measured a million miles upstream

Geomagnetic · Kp

Kp 1.33

Quiet — Aurora confined to high latitudes

DESK

The aurora desk

Tonight’s full sky →

Imagery: NASA SDO · gauges: NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center (GOES, DSCOVR/ACE) · refreshed every ten minutes · a gauge with no feed says so rather than holding its needle