Our Galaxy

Otherwise Software

About this app

Our Galaxy is a unique app for both amateur astronomers and astronomy educators. It helps you visualize the 3-dimensional locations of deep sky objects in and around our galaxy, and provides you with an understanding of their physical properties. It addition, it illustrates the structural components of the Galaxy, including the thin disk, thick disk, galactic bulge and stellar halo.

The 3-D interface allows you to see where the cluster or nebula of interest is located relative to the center and plane of the Galaxy. By panning around, or moving closer to or farther away from the object, you derive a sense of where the object really is in 3-dimensional space.

The app enhances the observing experience by helping the user arrive at an intuitive sense of physical location, size, luminosity, and distance for the chosen object. It also serves as a great tool for education and outreach with its unusual visual perspective on the location of deep sky objects and their relationship to the center and plane of our galaxy.

See more videos and screenshots at the otherwise.com website.

Our Galaxy is available on all major platforms.

Ratings and reviews

Only been using a few days, very good in parts - being able to look at different Messier objects, parts of the galaxy, the local group. Excellent. A few complaints though, you touch an object and then read a description, it would be really good if there was then a graphical view especially if it was incorporated into the overall display. I realise that would be quite complex. But a few decent images would be great Also, how do you recover objects that have been removed? Why is that an option?

This app can be fascinating and entertaining. As an amateur astronomer, I have learned from it. I have wondered at the few critical reviews. Perhaps it is because one has to bring a rudimentary level of knowledge about deep sky objects to get the most from Our Galaxy. For example, it is interesting to look at the distribution of globular clusters, visible open clusters and the stars we can see - if you have some acquaintance with them already. Even then, you'll have a deeper understanding.

FANTASTIC APP! This is the best app I've used to study astronomy. It's flexible, detailed and easy (all things being equal) to use. No constant barrage of commercials. No crashes, glitches.

What's new

• Improvements to the display of Search results.
• Search panel remembers previous search parameters. Use Reset to clear them.
• Added Proxima Centauri to database. Even though it's fainter than the 6th mag cutoff, it is special as the closest star other than the Sun.
• Fixed bug where the built-in view for the M81 Group was showing the Centaurus group by mistake.
• Miscellaneous small tweaks to database.
• Miscellaneous small UI tweaks.