Las Vegas, NV — light pollution & stargazing across the metro
The Las Vegas, NV light dome covers 11 towns and about 1,967,991 people rated together, reading roughly Bortle 9 — a inner-city sky (very poor — city glow) — at Las Vegas itself, measured from VIIRS 2024 satellite night-lights. The darkest edge of this same dome is Boulder City, about 22 mi out, at roughly Bortle 8. The nearest certified dark-sky destination is Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument, about 82 mi away. Tonight's Moon phase, cloud cover, and aurora odds load live below, computed in your browser.
Stargazing at the Las Vegas core tonight
- Estimated Bortle class (core)
- 9 of 9
- VIIRS radiance (core)
- 349 nW/cm²/sr
- Naked-eye limiting mag. (core)
- under 4.1
- Darkest edge of this dome
- Boulder City · B8 · 22 mi
Inner-city sky.
What you can see from the Las Vegas core
Only the Moon, the bright planets, and a scattering of the very brightest stars pierce the glow. For real stargazing you'll want to drive to a darker site.
At an estimated Bortle 9, the faintest stars visible from Las Vegas itself on a clear, moonless night run to about magnitude 4.0 or brighter, and the Milky Way is not visible. Boulder City is a regional drive away (22 mi) and improves to roughly Bortle 8.
Of the 11 towns rated in this dome, most read Bortle 8 (8 towns) — spread across 2 darkness classes overall. Beyond Las Vegas itself, Henderson, North Las Vegas, Paradise round out the largest towns sharing this same light dome.
The sky from 36.2°N
Declination above +53.8° never sets here, and below −53.8° never rises — no matter how clear the night or how long you wait.
- Never sets: Polaris, the Big Dipper
- Never rises: Alpha Centauri, the Southern Cross
- Skims the southern horizon: Canopus (peaks 1° up)
- Milky Way core: culminates 24.8° above the southern horizon — it climbs to a workable height in the south on summer nights.
- Longest night: 14 h 28 m at the December solstice, 9 h 32 m in June.
- Midsummer: the Sun reaches only 30.4° below the horizon at solar midnight in June — past the 18° astronomical-night mark.
Geometric, from 36.175°N, 115.137°W. How these are computed.
Every town in this light dome, darkest first
All 11 towns inside Las Vegas's ~35-mile dome, each with its own measured reading.
| Town | State | Bortle | Sky | Radiance |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Boulder City | NV | 8 | City sky | 44 |
| Summerlin South | NV | 8 | City sky | 48 |
| Spring Valley | NV | 8 | City sky | 49 |
| Enterprise | NV | 8 | City sky | 52 |
| Winchester | NV | 8 | City sky | 56 |
| Whitney | NV | 8 | City sky | 61 |
| Sunrise Manor | NV | 8 | City sky | 78 |
| Henderson | NV | 8 | City sky | 82 |
| North Las Vegas | NV | 9 | Inner-city sky | 105 |
| Paradise | NV | 9 | Inner-city sky | 171 |
| Las Vegas | NV | 9 | Inner-city sky | 349 |
Certified dark-sky destinations near Las Vegas
| Place | Designation | Distance |
|---|---|---|
| Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument | Dark Sky Park | 82 mi |
| Death Valley National Park | Dark Sky Park | 97 mi |
| Zion National Park | Dark Sky Park | 140 mi |
| Pipe Spring National Monument | Dark Sky Park | 140 mi |
| Kaibab Band of Paiute Indians | Dark Sky Community | 145 mi |
| Cedar Breaks National Monument | Dark Sky Park | 160 mi |
Other light domes near Las Vegas
Riverside, CA (200 mi, core Bortle 8) , Los Angeles, CA (230 mi, core Bortle 9) , and Phoenix, AZ (255 mi, core Bortle 9) are the closest other metro-scale domes tracked here — each with its own core reading and its own darkest edge.
Frequently asked questions
- Can you see the Milky Way from Las Vegas?
- Not from Las Vegas itself — at about Bortle 9 the dome is too bright. The darkest edge of the same metro is Boulder City, about 22 mi out at roughly Bortle 8, or drive to the certified Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument (82 mi) for a genuinely dark sky.
- How dark is the sky across the Las Vegas metro?
- It varies by how close you are to the core. Las Vegas itself reads about Bortle 9; the 11 towns in this light dome range down to Boulder City at roughly Bortle 8, about 22 mi from the core. The table above sorts every town in the metro by measured darkness.
- Where's the nearest certified dark-sky destination to Las Vegas?
- Grand Canyon-Parashant National Monument (Dark Sky Park), about 82 mi away.
A satellite proxy, not a survey-grade reading. Sources and limits.
More in Nevada
All Nevada towns · Bortle scale · Tonight's Moon · Dark-sky map