Where Is the ISS Right Now?
Live Map, Speed and Altitude

The International Space Station (ISS) is always somewhere between 51.6° north and 51.6° south latitude, about 400–420 km (250–260 miles) above Earth, travelling at roughly 28,000 km/h (17,500 mph). It moves almost 8 km every second and circles the planet about every 92 minutes, so its position changes constantly. The only precise answer to "where is the ISS right now?" is a live tracker that calculates its position second by second.

SatFleet Live shows the ISS in real time on a 2D map and a 3D globe, free and without an account. Open the map below to see exactly where the station is over Earth at this moment, then read on for how fast it travels, how high it flies and how to see it with your own eyes.

Where Is the ISS Right Now?

At any moment the ISS is over a different part of the world. One minute it is above the Atlantic, ten minutes later it is crossing Africa or Europe, and half an orbit later it is on the night side of the planet over the Pacific. Because it covers the distance from London to New York in about 12 minutes, a static answer is out of date almost as soon as it is written.

What never changes is the band it flies in. The station's orbit is tilted 51.6° to the equator, so it never passes directly over places further north than about 51.6° N (roughly the latitude of London or Calgary) or further south than 51.6° S. Everything inside that band, which is home to the large majority of the world's population, sees the ISS fly overhead at some point.

How to find the ISS on the SatFleet Live map

1. Open the SatFleet Live tracker. It loads in your browser, with no download or sign-up.
2. Find the ISS among the satellites on the map. It is the largest object in low Earth orbit and one of the easiest to pick out.
3. Click the ISS to see its current altitude, speed and position. Switch to the 3D globe to see its whole orbit around Earth, or read our guide to 3D satellite tracking to get the most out of that view.
4. To know when it will fly over you, open Next Passes and enter your location.

ISS Key Numbers at a Glance

The figures below are rounded, typical values. Altitude in particular varies over time, which is why a live tracker always shows a slightly different number from the one in a textbook.

Approximate values. Sources: NASA and orbital data from CelesTrak.

How Fast Does the ISS Travel?

The ISS travels at about 7.7 km per second, which is roughly 28,000 km/h or 17,500 mph. That is around 30 times faster than a passenger jet at cruising speed. In a single day the station covers more than 650,000 km, which is about 1.7 times the average distance from Earth to the Moon.

How long does it take the ISS to orbit Earth?

One full orbit takes about 92 to 93 minutes. That works out to roughly 15.5 orbits every 24 hours, so the crew see around 15 or 16 sunrises and sunsets each day. Roughly a third of every orbit is spent in Earth's shadow, which matters for anyone trying to see the station from the ground.

Why does the ISS have to go so fast?

Speed is what keeps it up. At about 400 km, an object needs a horizontal speed of roughly 7.7 km/s so that, as it falls towards Earth, the curved surface drops away beneath it at the same rate. Slower, and it would spiral down into the atmosphere. Our guide to how satellite orbits work explains this balance between speed and gravity in more detail.

How High Is the ISS?

The ISS usually orbits at about 400 to 420 km (250 to 260 miles) above the surface. That is about 40 times higher than an airliner cruises, yet still very close in space terms: it is in low Earth orbit (LEO), far below GPS satellites and the geostationary belt.

Why does the altitude of the ISS change?

Even at 400 km there is a trace of atmosphere. It drags on the station and makes it lose height slowly, and the effect is stronger when the Sun is more active and the upper atmosphere expands. To compensate, the station is periodically boosted back up using its own thrusters or the engines of visiting spacecraft.

Why doesn't the ISS fly higher?

A lower orbit is easier and cheaper to reach for the crew and cargo vehicles that visit the station, and it keeps the crew well below the more intense radiation found further out. The trade-off is that drag never stops, so the orbit needs regular maintenance.

Why Does the ISS Path Look Like a Wave on the Map?

On a flat map, the ISS draws an S-shaped curve called a ground track. The orbit itself is a near-perfect circle, but because it is tilted 51.6° to the equator, its projection onto a flat map rises to 51.6° N, crosses the equator and falls to 51.6° S on every lap.

The wave also moves. During the 92 minutes the station takes to go around once, Earth rotates by about 23° underneath it, so each new orbit crosses the equator about 23° further west than the last. Over a day or so, those shifted tracks cover the whole band between the two latitude limits. The 51.6° inclination was chosen in part so that Russian vehicles launched from Baikonur could reach the station directly.

Can You See the ISS From Where You Are?

Yes. The ISS is one of the brightest objects in the night sky. It looks like a steady, bright white light, with no blinking and no coloured lights, moving smoothly from one side of the sky to the other in up to about six minutes. On a good pass it outshines every star and usually every planet except Venus.

You can only see it under specific conditions: your sky must be dark, but the station, 400 km up, must still be in sunlight. That happens in the hour or two after sunset or before sunrise. During the rest of the night it is in Earth's shadow and invisible. Because it is high enough to be seen from a long way off, you can spot it even if you live a little outside the 51.6° band, low over the horizon.

The exact times change every night. Our guide on when and where to see the ISS tonight explains how to plan a sighting, and Next Passes gives you the start time, direction and maximum height of each visible pass for your location.

Is There an ISS Live Camera?

NASA broadcasts live video from the station on its official channels, such as NASA+ and its YouTube channel, including coverage of spacewalks, spacecraft arrivals and departures, and views of Earth from orbit. You can find the current streams on the NASA website.

The picture often goes dark or switches to a still image: on the night side of the orbit there is little to see, and the signal drops when the station moves between communication satellites. Also, the video shows what the station sees, not where it is. Keeping a live tracker open next to the stream tells you which country or ocean is passing below the camera.

How Is the Position of the ISS Calculated?

Like other satellites, the ISS is tracked by the US Space Force, which publishes its orbit as a Two-Line Element set (TLE) through Space-Track. CelesTrak redistributes this data publicly. A TLE is a compact description of the orbit at a given moment, and a standard model called SGP4 uses it to work out where the station is at any other time.

That is what a tracker like SatFleet Live does: it takes the latest TLE for catalogue number 25544 and recalculates the station's position continuously. A recent TLE gives a very accurate position, and accuracy slowly drops as the data ages. After a reboost, predictions stay off until a fresh element set is published. If you want to read one yourself, our guide What Is a TLE and How to Read It walks through every field.

How Does the ISS Compare With Other Spacecraft?

The ISS is the largest and easiest-to-see object you can track. Here is how its orbit compares with other well-known spacecraft.

Approximate values; altitudes change over time.

China's station flies a little lower than the ISS and on a less tilted orbit, so it never travels as far north or south. Our guide to the Tiangong space station covers its modules, orbit and how to see it.

Who Is on the ISS Right Now?

The ISS has had people on board without interruption since 2 November 2000. Right now there are 11 people on the station, from NASA, Roscosmos and partner agencies such as ESA, JAXA and CSA. Crews rotate every few months, so the list changes regularly. The table below is updated automatically every time this page loads.

Data: The Space Devs. Updated automatically when the page loads. Last updated: October 5, 2026.

For everyone in orbit, including the crew of China's Tiangong station, see how many people are in space right now.

How much longer will the ISS stay in orbit?

NASA's current plan is to operate the station until about 2030 and then bring it down in a controlled re-entry over a remote area of the South Pacific, using a deorbit vehicle built by SpaceX. Extending its life beyond 2030 has been proposed in the US Congress, so the final date could still change.

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