Orbitarius

Four ways to explore

Each Orbitarius mode focuses on a different question about the Solar System and lets you answer it interactively in 3D.

• Solar System — the live, physics-based model with all eight planets, fifteen named moons, dwarf planets and select asteroids.
• Custom Sandbox — start from an empty universe and place your own stars, planets, moons, or black holes to see what gravity does next.
• Size Comparison — line up planets, moons, dwarf planets, asteroids, stars, and even black holes side by side at consistent scale.
• Planet Loops — visualize apparent retrograde motion of Mars, Jupiter, or Saturn as seen from Earth, and understand why the ancients saw loops in the sky.

Real numbers, not pretty animations

Bodies move according to Newtonian gravity. Initial planet positions and velocities come from ephemeris data for the current date, so what you see roughly matches where each planet is in the real sky right now. Axial tilts, rotation periods, and orbital inclinations are taken from observed values — Venus rotates retrograde, Uranus is tipped 97.8 degrees, Triton orbits Neptune backwards, and you can see all of it.

Built for browsers

Orbitarius runs on Babylon.js and WebGL, with custom shaders for planet shading, atmospheres, eclipses, and the Sun's corona. Planet textures are stored in KTX2 (Basis Universal) format so the GPU can decode them directly. Streaming asset loading means the simulation appears within seconds, even on a fresh visit — moons and small bodies finish loading in the background while you are already moving the camera.