# Sol Orrery — The solar system, right now

> The solar system, right now (iPhone/iPad app by Randy Ramos.)

- Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/sol-orrery/id6816479230 (this page in markdown: same URL + `.md`)
- Developer: [Randy Ramos](https://appshunter.io/developer/6798884865)
- Category: Education, Reference
- Price: $3.99
- Age rating: 4+
- Requires: iOS 16.0 · 43 MB
- Languages: American English
- Released: 2026-10-08
- Data updated: 2026-10-10
- User reviews in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/sol-orrery/id6816479230/reviews.md

## What is Sol Orrery?

Sol Orrery is a solar system you can trust. Every position is computed from published orbital elements for the date and time you choose - not an animation loop.

Watch Io's shadow cross Jupiter's cloud tops. Stand on Europa with Jupiter filling 12 degrees of sky. Follow Voyager 1 past 172 AU, or pull back until the whole Milky Way turns beneath you.

WHAT YOU GET

- The planets, from photographic surface maps - real continents, real cloud bands, Saturn's rings casting shadows on the planet and taking its shadow back.
- 21 moons, each in its own orbit, with the tidally locked ones keeping one face turned home.
- Eight comets on their true orbits - Halley, Hale-Bopp, Encke and more - growing dust and ion tails as they near the Sun.
- 43 real spacecraft, each modelled and placed: Voyager 1 and 2, New Horizons, Parker Solar Probe, JUICE, Europa Clipper, Juno, Perseverance, the ISS and Tiangong.
- Around 9,000 satellites in Earth orbit - Starlink's real shells, GPS, Galileo, the geostationary belt - dimming as they pass into Earth's shadow.
- Eclipses that are actually computed: the Moon turning copper in Earth's umbra, a moon's shadow tracking across a planet's face.
- Stand on a world: Tranquility Base, Jezero crater, the ice of Europa, the south pole of Enceladus. Angular sizes are true - the Sun really is three times wider from Mercury.
- Time from real-time to 100 million years per second, forwards or backwards, across a billion years.
- True scale mode: swap the readable layout for real sizes at real distances.
- Zoom out past the heliopause, through the Oort cloud and the nearest stars, to the Galaxy - with our own position marked.

HONEST ABOUT ITS LIMITS

Planet positions use JPL's approximate elements (accurate within about 1800-2050); the lunar theory is good to roughly a tenth of a degree, so eclipse times are approximate to a few minutes. Spacecraft cruise paths between real flyby dates are interpolated. The app says so, on the panel for each object, rather than pretending otherwise.

No account, no ads, no tracking, no network. Everything runs on your device, offline.

Planetary and lunar surface maps by Solar System Scope (solarsystemscope.com), used under CC BY 4.0.


## Version history (last 3 releases)

### 1.2 — 2026-10-10

Sol Orrery 1.2 is a big update.

NEW
- Black hole at the heart of the Milky Way: fly to Sagittarius A* and orbit a ray-traced black hole, with the real orbit of the star S2 and a switch between a bright Cinematic look and the faithful Observed look. Pinch to zoom from the whole galaxy down to the event horizon.
- Look at the Sun: six filters using real NASA Solar Dynamics Observatory images (a dimmed solar filter, visible light, magnetic map, and ultraviolet views of the corona, prominences and flares).
- Real stars: about 9,000 stars from the Yale Bright Star Catalogue.
- Real surfaces: NASA and USGS maps for the moons of Jupiter, Saturn, Uranus and Neptune, plus Pluto, Charon, Ceres and more.
- Realistic spacecraft: the James Webb Space Telescope, the International Space Station and Voyager are now NASA's own detailed models.
- Interstellar visitors: Oumuamua, Borisov and 3I/ATLAS on their real paths.
- Galaxies with real photographs, from Andromeda to the Local Group.
- Guided tours: new tours of the galactic centre, the Sun, the interstellar visitors and the galaxies, plus a smoother overview tour.

IMPROVED
- Tour camera flights are smoother and no longer get stuck.
- Info cards can be folded or hidden.
- The app opens with its own music.

Still $3.99 once. No ads, no tracking, works offline.

### 1.1 — 2026-10-09

Explore guided tours for every Browse group or the whole orrery, choose and control tracks in the compact music player, and hide selected-object details when you want a clear view. Search now clears in one tap, and planetary motion is slower and more cinematic.

### 1.0 — 2026-10-09

No release notes.

## More apps by Randy Ramos

- [PULSAR: Orbital Reflex](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/pulsar-orbital-reflex/id6798913564)
- [World at War: Conflict Atlas](https://appshunter.io/ios/app/world-at-war-conflict-atlas/id6816533743)

All apps by Randy Ramos: https://appshunter.io/developer/6798884865

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*Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-10-10.*