When is the Leonid meteor shower in 2026, and how do you see it?

The Leonids are expected to peak on the night of 17 to 18 November 2026. The International Meteor Organization (IMO) puts the maximum at 17 November, about 23:45 UT, and the best time to watch almost everywhere is after midnight and before dawn on 18 November. Expect a modest shower: from a dark site, roughly 5 to 15 meteors an hour.

What makes this year worth getting up for is the company. On the same mornings Mars and Jupiter sit together in Leo, close to where the meteors come from.

Leonids 2026 at a glance

	Expected (2026)
Active	6 to 30 November (IMO)
Maximum	17 November, about 23:45 UT (IMO); one model gives 17 November, 16:00 UT
ZHR at peak	About 15 (ideal sky, radiant overhead)
Realistic count, dark site	About 5 (NAOJ, Japan) to 10-15 (Royal Observatory Greenwich) per hour
Moon	New 9 Nov, first quarter 17 Nov; about half lit, setting around midnight
Radiant	In the Sickle of Leo; rises around midnight, highest before dawn
Speed	71 km/s, among the fastest meteors
Parent	Comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle

Which night should you go out?

The radiant in Leo only rises around midnight, so the shower is a pre-dawn affair. The exact hour of the peak is uncertain: the IMO’s main time is 23:45 UT on the 17th, and Maslov’s model puts it at 16:00 UT the same day, both with a ZHR of about 15.

• Europe and the UK: the morning of 18 November, from moonset until twilight. The IMO maximum is 23:45 in London and 00:45 in Paris or Berlin, so you are close to it.
• North America: the mornings of 17 and 18 November sit at about the same distance from the peak (it falls at 6:45 p.m. in New York). Go out on whichever morning is clear, or both.
• Japan and East Asia: the morning of 18 November. Japan’s national observatory (NAOJ) gives the maximum as about 9:00 JST on the 18th and calls the pre-dawn hours of the 18th the best time, with about 5 meteors an hour.
• Southern Hemisphere: Leo rises later and stays lower, so rates drop. Try the last hours before dawn on 18 November.

The IMO calendar also lists several weak encounters with old dust trails of the comet between 17 and 19 November (around 21:55 UT on the 18th and 03:30 to 03:50 UT on the 19th, for example). The modellers expect low-level activity at most, with no outburst.

The Moon in 2026: gone by the time Leo is up

First quarter falls on 17 November, so on peak night a half Moon hangs in the evening sky. It sets about when the radiant rises:

City	Moonset, night of 17-18 Nov	Night of 16-17 Nov
London	23:29	22:15
New York	23:55	22:52
Tokyo	23:11	22:11
Sydney	01:37 (18th)	01:08 (17th)

Times from timeanddate.com. After moonset you get dark sky until dawn twilight, which is why the IMO says moonlight won’t disturb near-maximum Leonid watching this year.

Mars and Jupiter in the lion

In mid-November Mars and Jupiter are both in Leo, rising around midnight and riding high in the south before dawn. They pass about 1.2° apart on 16 November (around 02:04 UT), about the width of your little finger held at arm’s length. Jupiter shines at magnitude -2.1, Mars at +0.7. NAOJ points out that the pair and Regulus, Leo’s brightest star, form a long, thin triangle. The two planets stay close for a few mornings either side, so on 17 and 18 November you get both: the planets and the shower in the same patch of sky.

How to find the radiant

The Leonids seem to fly out of the Sickle, the backward question mark of stars that forms the lion’s head, above Regulus. You don’t have to stare at it. Meteors appear all over the sky, and the ones far from the radiant leave longer trails, as NASA notes. Lie back with your feet toward the east and take in as much sky as you can.

I build Sky Map, so weigh this tip with that in mind: after midnight, point the AR view east and it labels Leo, Regulus, Mars and Jupiter over the camera image, so you can tell the planets from the stars and see where the shower comes from. The astronomical calendar in the app lists meteor showers, and Tonight’s Sky Conditions shows cloud cover and humidity for your spot. Sky Map: Constellation Finder is free to download on the App Store; more on the Sky Map app page.

Getting the most out of a November morning

1. Get away from lights. With a ZHR of 15, a town sky can leave you with one or two an hour (city stargazing tips).
2. Give your eyes 20 to 30 minutes and keep the phone dim (dark adaptation).
3. Dress for a cold night. A reclining chair or a mat and sleeping bag will keep you out for an hour.
4. Skip the telescope. Your eyes cover the most sky. Binoculars are only for Mars and Jupiter.

Leonids are famous for storms: NASA lists thousands of meteors a minute in 1966, and the last storm was in 2002. 2026 is not a storm year. The comet’s next perihelion is on 20 May 2031, and the IMO says Earth won’t meet a dense debris cloud again until 2099. If you want the big one this season, it’s the Geminids on 13 to 14 December.

More: the year’s meteor showers and eclipses and which planets are visible tonight.

Sources: IMO 2026 Meteor Shower Calendar (PDF) (maximum, ZHR, activity, radiant, speed, dust trails, moonlight) and IMO calendar page (storm history); NASA Science: Leonids (comet, rates, viewing tips); NAOJ: Tokyo sky, November 2026 and NAOJ: Mars and Jupiter (Japan timing and rate, planet triangle); Royal Observatory Greenwich: November 2026 highlights (rates, conjunction); In-The-Sky.org: Jupiter and Mars (separation, magnitudes); timeanddate.com Moon phases 2026 and moonset times. Checked 1 November 2026. Rates and timings are forecasts.