This May, Earth will sail through the debris from a comet many thousands of years old.
Between April and May every year, Halley’s Comet is responsible for the Eta Aquariid meteor shower (sometimes spelled Eta Aquarid, or η-Aquariids). Read on and find out more, including how to see one of 2025’s best meteor showers.
How a comet causes a meteor shower
The first written description of Halley’s Comet appears 240 BCE in the Chinese chronicle Records of the Grand Historian. But before Edmond Halley’s Synopsis of the Astronomy of Comets in 1705, it was widely thought that comets sailed a straight path through the solar system.
Halley challenged this idea. He calculated that a comet seen in 1682 was also spotted in 1531, and again in 1607, giving it an ‘orbital period’ of around 76 years. Halley didn’t live to see his comet’s return, but it arrived as predicted in 1758.
Halley’s Comet comes blazing through our solar system around every 75 years. Then, about every six months, we pass through the dust, grit, and cometary rubble it leaves behind. It’s this debris field that forms the famous Eta Aquariid meteor shower.
Halley’s Comet has been recorded for thousands of years, and it’s likely been in its current orbit for tens of thousands of years – possibly as long as 200,000 years. So we’ve got plenty more meteor showers to come!
When is the Eta Aquariids meteor shower in 2025?
The Eta Aquariids meteor shower lasts from 9th April until 28th May every year.
Unlike some other meteor showers, there isn’t a sharp peak for the Eta Aquariids. Instead, it has more of a rounded maximum that lasts up to about 36 hours between the 5th and 6th May.
Your celestial viewing experience won’t vary dramatically either side of these days, so it’s OK if you have other plans or need to get more sleep.
What you need for viewing a meteor shower
One of the best things about meteor showers is all you need is to escape somewhere dark. Get away to an astrotourism town, away from the sky glow of cities and towns and their streetlights.
You don’t need binoculars or a telescope for a meteor shower, you’re better off leisurely scanning the constellations around Aquarius, rather than looking directly at the constellation.
Take a camping chair or a picnic rug, wrap up in warm clothing, and settle in to patiently watch the night sky in all its beauty.
What you can expect from the Eta Aquariids meteor shower
Realistically, you can expect to see 10 – 30 meteors per hour with good conditions and a little patience.
The Eta Aquariids meteor shower is famous for fast, long-lived meteors that leave glowing trails. This makes for excellent stargazing when you’re somewhere with dark skies.
The Moon is in its first quarter on May 6th, setting around 12.50am, long before the meteor shower is at its best.
The International Meteor Organisation has the shower’s official peak (for the highest number of shooting stars) at around 3am UTC 6th May. Unfortunately, that’s 11am AWST.
The Eta Aquariids are visible above the eastern horizon from around 1.45am, and are active until the break of dawn, around 06:25am. This means your best view is going to be in the darkest hours after the Moon sets and before dawn.
Jay Chesters
Jay Chesters is a wordsmith with a little bit of a thing for the stars. As a cosmic storyteller with a love for astronomy and space that's out of this world, Jay’s always eager to share his knowledge and passions.
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