Perseid Meteor Shower 2025: Why You Need To Change Your Plans
The Perseids — the most popular meteor shower of the year — is set to disappoint skywatchers in August 2025, with an almost full moon destined to blot out all but the brightest shooting stars. However, if you plan carefully, there is a way to see them.
Active from July 17 to August 23, 2025, the Perseid meteor shower's peak night will this year occur overnight on Tuesday, August 12 through Wednesday, August 13, with the early hours of the latter the time to view — though not this year.
Unfortunately, the sky won't be dark enough to see most of the 100-150 shooting stars because an 84% waning gibbous moon — a few days after being a full 'Sturgeon Moon' — will rise about 10 p.m. local time, just as it gets dark, and shine brightly for the rest of the night. Moonlight will likely wash out all but the brightest meteors.
The best advice this year is to avoid the peak night, instead concentrating on the three subsequent evenings when rates of meteors should still be relatively high. On Thursday, August 14, a 65%-lit moon will rise about an hour after dark; on Friday, August 15, a 53%-lit moon will rise two hours after dark; and on Saturday, August 16, a 41%-lit moon will rise after midnight. This night gives at least a small window to see Perseids.
The Perseids are an annual meteor shower caused by Earth busting through streams of dust and debris left in the inner solar system by a massive comet called 109P/Swift-Tuttle, an icy comet discovered in 1862.
The Lyrid meteor shower will begin on Thursday, April 17 and peak in the early hours of Tuesday, April 22. During that peak, about 18 shooting stars per hour, some very bright fireballs, are expected. Meanwhile, the Eta Aquarids will begin on April 19 and peak in the early hours of Monday, May 5 when around 40-60 shooting stars are possible.
According to NASA, with a nucleus 16 miles (26 kilometers) across, it's more than twice the size of the object thought to have killed the dinosaurs.
Comet Swift-Tuttle was last in the inner solar system in 1992 and won't be back until 2125. Each time it visits, it leaves debris on its orbital path that can cause shooting stars on Earth (and the other planets) for centuries. Each August, Earth moves through its debris, with the particles hitting its atmosphere, energizing and releasing energy as photons of light—shooting stars. Most are no larger than grains of sand, but they enter the atmosphere at speeds of over 130,000 miles per hour (210,000 kilometers per hour).
It largely has to do with timing and celestial geography. Its source constellation, Perseus, rises in the northeastern night sky in August, a popular time for camping trips — whether carefully planned to coincide with the event or not. It's also a fairly prolific and dependable meteor shower, with up to 100 shooting stars visible per hour during the peak night.
Contrary to popular belief, the Perseids aren't the most prolific meteor shower of the year. That honor goes to the Geminid meteor shower, which can see 150 shooting stars per hour on the peak night. Since the Geminids occur in mid-December, few in the Northern Hemisphere see it, but this year, it's the meteor shower to plan for.
Active from Monday, December 1 through Sunday, December 21, it will peak overnight on Friday, December 12 through Saturday, December 13, 2025. A waning crescent moon will rise about 2:00 a.m. local time, giving a long window to view the year's only meteor shower produced not by a comet but by an asteroid called 3200 Phaethon. If you want to see an impactful meteor shower in 2025, make it the Geminids — and perhaps travel somewhere relatively warm and famously dark to watch it from, such as the San Pedro de Atacama in Chile's Atacama desert or Namibia, to name but a few.
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