About

What 3D Universe is, what in it is measured and what is drawn, and who operates it.

What this is

3D Universe is an interactive model of the Solar System and the universe beyond it, built to help people explore astronomical scales, motion and structure. It runs in a desktop or phone browser. You can fly from the Earth to the planets and their moons, to 913 naked-eye stars, to nebulae, star clusters and galaxies, and out to a map of 669,377 galaxies and quasars measured by the DESI survey; set any date and watch the planets move; stand on the Earth and see the sky from a place you choose; and follow past and future eclipses.

What is measured and what is drawn

The positions of the planets and moons are calculated from published orbital theory for the instant shown. Star, nebula, cluster and galaxy positions, distances, sizes and classes come from published catalogues. Planet and moon surfaces are mission maps where a map exists.

Much of what you see close up is a model. Nobody has photographed the inside of a nebula or the far side of a distant galaxy in three dimensions. A galaxy here is generated from its catalogued class, size, tilt and orientation; a nebula’s depth is assumed; a star’s surface is an illustration. Scales are compressed so that objects can be seen at all, unless you switch on true sizes and true distances. The Evidence view marks each statement on an object card as measured, calculated, estimated, a display choice or illustrative, or as not yet linked to a source.

Limits

This is an educational model. It is not an ephemeris service, a navigation aid or a research instrument. Values are rounded for reading, catalogues disagree and are revised, and we make mistakes. Check anything that matters against the primary source named on the card, and tell us when you find an error.

Who is behind it

3D Universe is operated by Moneta Media Labs LLC. It is built with extensive help from AI software tools, working from published sources; see the Scientific & Editorial Policy. It has not been reviewed or endorsed by any space agency, observatory, university or scientific body.

Sources

Every file the site loads and every catalogue behind it is credited on Sources & Attribution.