Heliosphere - Solar System

What's New in 1.14.0 Positional Accuracy - The Moon is now where the real Moon is. It used to be drawn far from its true position even on eclipse days - The Moon's ecliptic latitude and orbital inclination are modelled. Every moon used to sit exactly in the ecliptic, which would mean an eclipse every single month - Planets travel real elliptical orbits instead of circles, speeding up near perihelion and slowing near aphelion as they should - Earth's rotation is anchored to real sidereal time, so the day/night terminator falls where it really does — and with a fixed axis, the seasons appear - All ten moons (the Moon, Phobos, Io, Titan and the rest) use measured orbital data - Verified against JPL Horizons positions across the full 1900-2100 range Eclipse Shadows - During a solar eclipse the Moon's shadow now falls on Earth in its true place - Umbra and penumbra are computed at real size. The umbra is about 2% of Earth's diameter, so it reads as a small dot — which is exactly how it looks from space - Annular eclipses draw a lighter shadow, because the Sun is never fully covered Three Scale Axes - Body size, orbit spacing and moon distance are three independent controls - Set all three to the right and the famous check holds: the other seven planets, laid end to end, just fit inside the Moon's orbit - At realistic size the Sun reaches its true 109 Earth radii - Your choices are remembered Navigation - Selecting a body follows it as time advances - You can tap orbiting planets directly in the 3D view - Two-finger drag slides the view - Step the date by exact units: 10 years, 1 year, 1 month, 1 week, 1 day - Step playback speed the same way: 1 hour, 1 day, 1 week, 1 month, 1 year per second - The speed range now reaches a year per second, so the slow outer planets — Neptune above all — finally get somewhere - The bottom bar can be hidden on iPhone Astronomical Events - Jump straight to an event's date from the calendar - Meteor showers jump to their peak, not the start of the viewing window Learning - New topic, "Scale and Distance", on why true scale cannot be drawn on a screen and what this app exaggerates as a result Other Improvements - Fixed moons such as Io appearing inside their parent planet at realistic size - Fixed the Moon's orbit overlapping Venus's - Fixed Triton not moving at all - Fixed the outer planets being clipped away when orbits were widened - Selecting a body now shows a shortcut into the Learning Center Your favorites, achievements and streak are all preserved.