The best astronomy apps for Mac in 2026, and which ones are iPad apps

For most people, the best astronomy app for a Mac is Stellarium: it's free and open source, and its Mac download runs on Apple silicon and Intel. If you want one that syncs with your iPhone, Night Sky has a proper Mac version for Apple silicon, and with 1.9K ratings it's the most-rated of these on the Mac App Store. SkySafari 8 Pro, Star Walk 2 and the Sky Guide app run on Apple silicon Macs only as their iPad apps, and Starry Night 8, the paid desktop planetarium, is an Intel build that needs Rosetta on Apple silicon Macs. Orbit, which I make, is a different sort of thing: the real sky as your wallpaper, not a planetarium you steer.

Every price and date below was read off the US App Store or the developer's own site on 20 October 2026. I'm a solo developer in Bengaluru with an obvious horse in this race, so I've put my app last and kept the rest to what their listings say.

Best astronomy apps for Mac at a glance

Can you run iPhone and iPad astronomy apps on a Mac?

Yes, if your Mac has Apple silicon, meaning an M1 chip or anything newer. Those Macs can run many iPhone and iPad apps straight from the Mac App Store: search for the app, then pick "iPhone & iPad Apps" at the top of the results (Apple). Their listings carry a "Designed for iPad" or "Designed for iPhone" badge (Apple Support). Intel Macs can't run them at all.

To see which Mac you have, open the Apple menu and choose About This Mac. A line that says "Chip" means Apple silicon; "Processor" means Intel (Apple Support). A Mac that runs macOS 27 is always Apple silicon (MacRumors).

An iPad app on a Mac is the same app as on the iPad, unmodified, in a window (Apple Developer). The best trick these apps have, holding the phone up so the screen lines up with the sky, doesn't come with it. A Mac has no gyroscope or compass, so you drag the sky around with the trackpad or mouse instead. You can lift a MacBook towards Orion if you like; the stars on screen won't follow.

If a listing says "Not verified for macOS", the developer hasn't confirmed the app works fully on a Mac; it doesn't mean it's broken (Apple). Developers can also keep an app off the Mac entirely. SkySafari 8 Pro runs on a Mac; SkySafari 8 Plus, from the same people, doesn't. An app you already bought on your iPhone or iPad, if it's offered for the Mac, shows up in your purchased apps in the Mac App Store.

Stellarium for Mac: the free desktop planetarium

Stellarium is a full planetarium for Mac, Windows and Linux, free and open source (GPL-2.0, per GitHub). Its default catalogue has over 600,000 stars, and optional ones add more than 220 million (stellarium.org), which is over 76,000 times as many as my app draws. If you own a telescope, its plugins can steer it, and they can also show satellites, the ISS among them.

Version 26.3 came out on 28 September 2026, its third release this year after 26.1 in April and 26.2 in June (GitHub releases). The Mac download, a 553 MB ZIP, works on macOS 11 or later and runs natively on Apple silicon and Intel. The site recommends rather more: macOS 12, 4 GB of memory, OpenGL 3.3 graphics and 10 GB of disk.

You won't find it on the Mac App Store. A search of Apple's Mac listings turned up no desktop Stellarium, so get it from stellarium.org or GitHub. Stellarium Mobile is a separate phone app, free with a paid Stellarium Plus upgrade, and its listing offers no Mac version. If you'd rather install nothing, Stellarium Web runs in a browser on any Mac.

Night Sky app for Mac

Of the apps that started on the phone, Night Sky by iCandi Apps is the most at home on a Mac. Its Mac page carries no iPad badge and reads "Designed and Optimized for macOS 27". It needs macOS 13.3 and an M1 chip or later, so Intel Macs are out (Mac App Store). The Mac version is 27.0, from 14 September 2026.

The listing says the Mac version syncs your Sky Tours and favourites with Night Sky on an iPhone or iPad, and identifies stars, planets, constellations and satellites, the International Space Station included. Its 1.9K Mac ratings average 4.5 stars, and no other Mac page here shows more than 47.

The download is free, and the extras come by subscription, Night Sky+ or Night Sky+ Aura. Aura costs $9.99 a week, $17.99 a month or $69.99 a year in the US.

SkySafari on Mac: which version runs

SkySafari has the busiest family tree of the lot: Simulation Curriculum sells five versions on Apple's store, and three of them run on a Mac.

The Mac listing for SkySafari 8 Pro, the current top version, reads "Designed for iPad. Not verified for macOS." Its SkySafari Premium upgrade is an extra $49.99 (the listing doesn't give a period) or $5.99 a month (App Store). At $17.99, SkySafari 7 Pro is the cheapest SkySafari that runs on a Mac, again as its iPad app (App Store).

SkySafari 6 Pro is the last native Mac version (Mac App Store). It first came out in March 2018, needs macOS 10.10 or later, and was last updated on 21 April 2021. The official SkySafari site says "Download on iOS & Android" and doesn't mention the Mac.

Starry Night 8 on a Mac

Google's top suggestion for "starry night mac" is a MAC Cosmetics eyeshadow, so search for Starry Night 8.

Starry Night 8 is the classic paid desktop planetarium, sold as a download by Simulation Curriculum (the SkySafari people) rather than through the Mac App Store. The official page lists four editions: CSAP 8 at $59.95, Enthusiast 8 at $89.95, Pro 8 at $159.95 and Pro Plus 8 at $259.95, all for macOS 10.12 or later. Telescope control comes with Pro 8 and Pro Plus 8 only, according to the official comparison chart. The page gives no last-updated date for version 8.

Simulation Curriculum says on its support forum that version 8 and earlier are built only for Intel Macs, that version 8 won't be updated, and that a version 9 for Apple silicon is planned. On an Apple silicon Mac it runs through Rosetta 2, Apple's translator, which Apple says stays available as a general tool through macOS 27 and then shrinks to a subset for older games (Apple Developer). If you're buying a desktop copy for a new Mac, ask the developer first. Starry Night Web runs in a browser instead, for $29.99 a year or $3.99 a month.

Star Walk 2 and Sky Guide on a Mac

Both of these are phone apps first, and on a Mac both are their iPad apps, which means an M1 or later.

Vito Technology's Star Walk 2 Pro costs $2.99 with add-ons from $0.99 to $2.99, needs macOS 12, and was last updated on 10 August 2026 (App Store). Star Walk 2 Plus is free with ads; $8.99 removes them and adds content. Vito Technology has no native Mac app on Apple's store.

The Sky Guide app, from Fifth Star Labs, is free, with in-app purchases from $1.99 (all constellations) up to $249.99 (PRO Lifetime). On the Mac it's the iPad app and needs macOS 13; version 13.1 came out on 14 October 2026 (App Store). Fifth Star Labs' own site offers it for iPhone, iPad and Apple Watch, with no word about the Mac.

Orbit: the night sky as your Mac wallpaper (not a planetarium)

Orbit doesn't belong in the same box as the apps above, and I'd rather say so before you spend anything. It's a live wallpaper: the real sky over one of 13 cities or your own location, drawn under your desktop icons and redrawn once a minute, with the stars, constellation lines, the five planets you can see without a telescope, the Moon in its true phase and the Sun by day.

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A closer look

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A dark night sky drawn as a Mac wallpaper: thin grey constellation lines and scattered stars, a gold label reading Saturn near the top left, a label reading Fomalhaut in the middle, and dark hills along the bottom with the compass letters SE, S and SW.

During a visible pass the space station crosses the desktop on time, from the second it rises to the second it sets, while the desktop is in view (a very high pass leaves by the top of the screen). The menu bar shows the Moon in tonight's phase; click it for a briefing on the Sun, Moon, planets, next pass, next launch and aurora chances. The ISS alerts guide covers the optional alert five minutes before a pass.

There's no zoom, pan or search, and you can't click a star, since the window ignores the mouse. It can't steer a telescope or wind the clock forward to tomorrow, and it draws no nebulae. Its 2,874 stars are only the brighter naked-eye ones, down to about magnitude 5.5 (bigger numbers are fainter), and your city's light pollution is left out.

It moves at the sky's real pace, too slowly to watch, but it puts things in the right place. The Saturn in the picture sits 50.46° up by Orbit's sums and 50.49° by NASA JPL's Horizons, checked on 20 October 2026 for the same minute over Los Angeles.

On my Mac mini, a Release build idled at 0.04% CPU (averaged over five minutes) and 22 MB of memory; the live wallpaper battery guide has the rest.

What is a good astronomy app for a Mac?

If the last one sounds like you, Orbit is $6.99 once on the Mac App Store (₹699 in India), with no subscription and nothing to buy inside it. It needs macOS 15 or later, runs on Apple silicon and Intel, and the download is 1.4 MB. The Mac page has the screenshots, and living with a real sky wallpaper has more of my stories.