Astronomy API

Name: Astronomy API API
Brand: Astronomy API
Availability: InStock

✓ Official Vendor SpecData EnrichmentData Transformationbasic7 EndpointsREST

For Agents

Look up celestial body positions, generate moon phase or star chart images, and search astronomy catalogues for a given date and observer location.

Quickstart

Get started with Astronomy API in minutes using your preferred integration method.

# Add to your MCP client config (Claude Desktop, Cursor, Windsurf)
{
  "jentic": {
    "url": "https://api.jentic.com/mcp",
    "auth": "oauth"
  }
}

# Then ask your agent:
"find a celestial body position for tonight"

# → Jentic returns the GET /events tool with parameter schema, agent executes.

Capabilities

What an agent can do with Astronomy API API.

Compute the position of a specific celestial body for an observer's latitude, longitude, and date via /bodies/positions/{body}

List astronomical events such as transits and oppositions for a body over a date range using /bodies/events/{body}

Generate a printable star chart image for a given location and viewing date through POST /studio/star-chart

Render a moon phase image scaled to the requested observation moment via POST /studio/moon-phase

GET STARTED

Start building with Astronomy API API

Explore with Jentic

View OpenAPI Document

Use for: Get the altitude and azimuth of Mars tonight from London, Generate a star chart image centred on Orion for tomorrow evening, Find when Jupiter rises and sets over the next week, Retrieve the current moon phase image

Not supported: Does not handle weather forecasts, satellite tracking, or telescope control — use for celestial body positions, events, and astronomy imagery only.

The Astronomy API returns positions of celestial bodies, predicts astronomical events, and renders star charts and moon phase images on demand. It covers the major Solar System bodies and a searchable catalogue of stars and deep space objects, accepting observer location and date inputs to produce horizon-relative coordinates. The Studio endpoints generate ready-to-display PNG charts so applications can drop astronomy visuals into pages without rolling their own ephemeris engine.

Use Cases

Patterns agents use Astronomy API API for, with concrete tasks.

★ Sky-Tonight Application

Consumer stargazing apps need to tell users which planets and bright stars are visible from their location right now. The Astronomy API answers this with /bodies/positions, returning altitude, azimuth, and constellation for each Solar System body relative to the observer, so the app can render a 'tonight's sky' summary without bundling its own ephemeris data. Latency is low enough for live mobile use.

Call GET /bodies/positions for latitude 51.5074, longitude -0.1278, on 2026-06-09 21:00 UTC and return the bodies with altitude greater than 10 degrees

Editorial Star Charts

News and educational sites publish weekly stargazing guides with charts. The Studio endpoints generate a star chart PNG for a chosen latitude, longitude, and timestamp, so an editorial CMS can pre-render charts for upcoming meteor showers or eclipses without an in-house astronomy stack. The chart returns as an image URL that can be embedded directly in articles.

POST to /studio/star-chart with latitude 40.7128, longitude -74.0060, observation date 2026-08-12 23:00, and view 'constellation: Perseus' to produce a chart image URL

Moon Phase Widget

Lifestyle and gardening apps display today's moon phase. The /studio/moon-phase endpoint renders the moon's illuminated fraction at the requested moment as a PNG, so the front end just embeds the returned URL. The same endpoint can be backdated for almanac-style content where a calendar shows the phase for each day of the month.

POST to /studio/moon-phase with date 2026-06-09 to retrieve the current phase image and percentage illuminated

Agent-Driven Astronomy Lookups via Jentic

Through Jentic, an AI agent answering an astronomy question searches by intent ('where is Mars tonight') and Jentic returns the matching /bodies/positions operation with its observer-location schema. Basic auth credentials are held in the Jentic vault, so the agent can call the API without seeing the application secret. This makes ad-hoc astronomy queries answerable inside any LLM-driven chat or workflow.

Use Jentic to search 'find Mars position tonight from my location', load the GET /bodies/positions/{body} schema, and execute with body='mars' and the user's coordinates

Key Endpoints

7 endpoints — the astronomy api returns positions of celestial bodies, predicts astronomical events, and renders star charts and moon phase images on demand.

METHOD

PATH

DESCRIPTION

GET

/bodies

List all supported celestial bodies

GET

/bodies/positions

Get positions for all bodies for an observer

GET

/bodies/positions/{body}

Get position of a specific body

GET

/bodies/events/{body}

Get events such as rise and set times for a body

POST

/studio/star-chart

Generate a star chart image

POST

/studio/moon-phase

Generate a moon phase image

GET

/search

Search stars and deep space objects

GET

/bodies

List all supported celestial bodies

GET

/bodies/positions

Get positions for all bodies for an observer

GET

/bodies/positions/{body}

Get position of a specific body

GET

/bodies/events/{body}

Get events such as rise and set times for a body

POST

/studio/star-chart

Generate a star chart image

Why though Jentic?

Three things that make agents converge on Jentic-routed access.

Credential isolation

Astronomy API basic auth credentials (application ID and secret) are stored encrypted in the Jentic vault. The agent never sees the secret — Jentic constructs the Authorization header at call time.

Intent-based discovery

Agents search Jentic by intent (e.g. 'find Mars position tonight') and Jentic returns the matching /bodies/positions operation with its observer-location parameters, so the agent calls the right endpoint without browsing docs.

Time to first call

Direct integration: a few hours to wire basic auth, observer parameters, and image-URL handling. Through Jentic: under 30 minutes — search, load, execute.

Related APIs

Alternatives and complements available in the Jentic catalogue.

Complementary

NASA APOD

NASA's Astronomy Picture of the Day, often paired with sky-tonight content

Choose NASA APOD when the task is editorial imagery rather than computed body positions

Complementary

NASA NeoWs

Near Earth Object Web Service for asteroid approaches

Choose NeoWs when the request is about asteroid flybys rather than planetary or lunar positions

Complementary

WeatherAPI

Weather and astronomy data including sunrise, sunset, and moonrise times

Choose WeatherAPI when sunrise, sunset, or sky-conditions context is needed alongside astronomy data

FAQs

Specific to using Astronomy API API through Jentic.

What authentication does the Astronomy API use?

The Astronomy API uses HTTP Basic Auth, with the application ID as the username and the application secret as the password. Through Jentic, both values are held in the Jentic vault and injected at call time, so they never appear in the agent's context.

Can I get the current position of a planet with the Astronomy API?

Yes. Call GET /bodies/positions/{body} with the body slug (for example 'mars'), the observer's latitude and longitude, and the date and time. The response returns the body's altitude, azimuth, and apparent constellation for that observer.

What are the rate limits for the Astronomy API?

Astronomy API plans publish per-minute and per-day quotas tied to the application key. The spec does not encode them, so check the dashboard for the active plan and back off on HTTP 429 responses.

How do I generate a star chart image through Jentic?

Search Jentic for 'generate a star chart', load the POST /studio/star-chart schema, and execute with the observer location, observation time, and chart style. Jentic returns the image URL produced by the API so the agent can hand it back to the caller.

Can I search for deep space objects with the Astronomy API?

Yes. The GET /search endpoint accepts a free-text query and returns matching stars and deep space objects from the catalogue, including identifiers that can then be passed back to /bodies/positions or chart generation.

Which celestial bodies does the Astronomy API support?

The API covers the Sun, Moon, and the major Solar System planets via the /bodies endpoint, which lists every supported body slug to use in subsequent position and event calls.