Stargazing near Ottawa tonight

Ottawa is surrounded by some of Ontario's best dark-sky sites — Bortle 2 wilderness is reachable in under 2 hours.

Updated: · Tonight: Friday, August 14, 2026

Best dark-sky site near Ottawa tonight

★ Best tonight

La Mauricie

Central QC · Bortle 3 · 255 km away

Excellent 9h of clear sky (≤30% cloud) during tonight's astronomical night, mean cloud 0%.

Best clear window: Fri 5:00 p.m. – Sat 1:00 a.m. (9h, 0% mean cloud)

Moon: New moon · 2% illuminated

Open live forecast → Site guide

How we picked tonight's best site

Show ranking debug panel (4 candidates, 7-level tie-break)

La Mauricie Lost on windowHours to North Frontenac (but earlier rule decided).

Site Verdict Window Win cloud Min cloud Mean cloud Bortle Distance
North Frontenac Excellent (5) 8h 2% 0% 22% 2 109.9 km
Bon Echo Excellent (5) 8h 1% 0% 21% 3 131.3 km
Algonquin Excellent (5) 7h 0% 0% 30% 3 207.5 km
★ La Mauricie Excellent (5) 9h 0% 0% 0% 3 255.1 km

★ = chosen by tie-break ladder. Lower cloud %, lower Bortle, lower distance = better. Higher windowHours = better.

Tie-break ladder (in order)

  1. verdictRank (desc) — Excellent > Good > Fair > Poor > No-go
  2. windowHours (desc) — Longer clear window wins
  3. windowMeanCloudPct (asc) — Cleaner sky inside the window
  4. tonightMinCloudPct (asc) — Best moment of the night
  5. tonightMeanCloudPct (asc) — Overall sky quality
  6. bortle (asc) — Darker site wins
  7. distanceKm (asc) — Closer wins last

Same metrics are exposed at snapshot.json as bestTonight.tieBreak and closestSites[].tieBreak.

Understand tonight's forecast for Ottawa

Each verdict above blends four limiting factors. Tap a card to learn what it measures, where the number comes from, and how to use it.

📖 How to read the forecast Plain-English breakdown of every row, color and score. 🌙 Moon & tonight's window New moon · 2% illuminated ☁️ Cloud cover & sky score Mean cloud tonight: 0% (min 0%). 🔭 Transparency How clean the air column is — controls how faint a star you can see. 🔥 Smoke & AQI Wildfire smoke and PM2.5 from US-AQI — kills transparency before clouds do.

All 4 closest sites, ranked by distance

North Frontenac

Frontenac, ON · Bortle 2 · 110 km away

Excellent 8h of clear sky (≤30% cloud) during tonight's astronomical night, mean cloud 22%.

Best clear window: Fri 5:00 p.m. – Sat 12:00 a.m. (8h, 2% mean cloud)

Moon: New moon · 2% illuminated

Open live forecast → Site guide

Bon Echo

Land O'Lakes, ON · Bortle 3 · 131 km away

Excellent 8h of clear sky (≤30% cloud) during tonight's astronomical night, mean cloud 21%.

Best clear window: Fri 5:00 p.m. – Sat 12:00 a.m. (8h, 1% mean cloud)

Moon: New moon · 2% illuminated

Open live forecast → Site guide

Algonquin

Nipissing, ON · Bortle 3 · 208 km away

Excellent 7h of clear sky (≤30% cloud) during tonight's astronomical night, mean cloud 30%.

Best clear window: Fri 5:00 p.m. – Fri 11:00 p.m. (7h, 0% mean cloud)

Moon: New moon · 2% illuminated

Open live forecast → Site guide

La Mauricie

Central QC · Bortle 3 · 255 km away

Excellent 9h of clear sky (≤30% cloud) during tonight's astronomical night, mean cloud 0%.

Best clear window: Fri 5:00 p.m. – Sat 1:00 a.m. (9h, 0% mean cloud)

Moon: New moon · 2% illuminated

Open live forecast → Site guide

Frequently asked questions

Where can I stargaze near Ottawa tonight?

Tonight's best site near Ottawa is La Mauricie (255 km away). Verdict: Excellent. 9h of clear sky (≤30% cloud) during tonight's astronomical night, mean cloud 0%.

What is the closest dark-sky site to Ottawa?

North Frontenac is the closest, about 110 km from Ottawa (Bortle 2).

Can I see the Milky Way from Ottawa?

Ottawa's urban sky is too light-polluted for naked-eye Milky Way. For a clear view of the galactic band, drive to a Bortle 1–3 site such as North Frontenac, Bon Echo, Algonquin, La Mauricie.

When are northern lights visible near Ottawa?

Aurora is visible during geomagnetic storms with Kp ≥ 5–6. Check the live aurora outlook and head to the closest dark site with a clean northern horizon.

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