Leonids 2026: when to see the fast meteors from Leo

The Leonids peak on November 17, at about 23:45 UTC. They are some of the fastest meteors of the year.

The rate at the peak is about 15 meteors an hour. That number is for a perfect sky, with Leo overhead. From a dark place you see fewer.

This year the Moon is about half lit. It lights the evening sky, then it sets near midnight. After it sets, there is no moonlight until dawn.

When to look

Look on the night of November 17 to 18. That is the best night for most of the world.

Wait for the Moon to set. Here are the moonset times for that night:

Leo rises late. It is highest at about 6:30 am, near dawn. So the last 2 or 3 hours of the night are the best.

From the south, Leo stays lower. In Sydney it gets only about 30 degrees high before dawn, so you see fewer meteors.

Where to look

The meteors seem to come from the head of Leo, a shape like a backwards question mark. But they cross the whole sky. Look at a wide part of the sky, about halfway up.

See the Leonids on the live sky map, from your place, at the best time to look.

Where to go

A dark sky shows many more meteors than a town sky. Find a park or a reserve in our list of stargazing places, or see the dark places for the Leonids in your country.

How to watch

  1. Set an alarm for the hours before dawn.
  2. Dress warm. November nights are cold in the north.
  3. Lie back on a chair or a mat.
  4. Put your phone away. Your eyes need 20 to 30 minutes in the dark.

The famous storms

The Leonids come from Comet Tempel-Tuttle. Its dust hits our air at about 71 km a second. In some years Earth goes through a thick trail of fresh dust. Then the Leonids become a storm. In 1966, people in the western United States saw thousands of meteors a minute for a short time. 2026 is a normal year, with no storm.

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