Where Is the James Webb Space Telescope?
Nowhere you can track it, and that is the interesting part. Webb is not in orbit around the Earth at all — it sits 1.5 million km away, roughly four times further than the Moon, at a point that moves with us around the Sun.
Why you cannot track Webb like a satellite
It is not orbiting Earth
Webb orbits the Sun, in step with the Earth, near the L2 point 1.5 million km out. Satellite trackers propagate Earth orbits — there is no Earth orbit here to propagate.
It is four times further than the Moon
The ISS is about 420 km up. The Moon is 384,000 km. Webb is roughly 1.5 million km away, so far that a radio command takes about five seconds each way.
L2 is a balance point, not a place
At L2 the gravity of the Sun and Earth combine so a spacecraft keeps pace with Earth’s year rather than falling behind. Webb flies a wide halo around it, staying in permanent sunlight so its sunshield can point one way and its mirrors the other.
It is not in the catalogue
The public catalogue that drives this site lists objects in Earth orbit. Webb has never been in it, which is why no satellite tracker — this one included — can honestly display its live position.
Every other satellite on this site is somewhere you can point at. Webb is not. It orbits the second Sun–Earth Lagrange point, L2, a gravitational balance point 1.5 million km directly out along the Earth–Sun line. Nothing physical is there; it is simply the place where the combined pull of the Sun and Earth keeps a spacecraft moving at the same rate as the Earth itself, so it stays put relative to us as we both go round the Sun. Webb does not sit exactly at L2 either — it traces a wide halo orbit around the point, roughly the size of the Moon’s orbit, which keeps it out of Earth’s shadow so its solar panels stay lit. This is the reason a satellite tracker cannot show it. The SGP4 model that computes every other position on this site describes objects orbiting the Earth, using orbital elements published for Earth-orbiting objects. Webb is not one, has no such elements, and does not appear in the catalogue at all.
Frequently asked questions
Can I track the James Webb Space Telescope live?
Not with a satellite tracker. It is not in Earth orbit and has no orbital elements of the kind trackers use. NASA publishes its distance and status on the mission’s own pages.
How far away is Webb?
About 1.5 million kilometres from Earth — roughly four times the distance to the Moon.
What is L2?
The second Sun–Earth Lagrange point: a position 1.5 million km beyond Earth, directly away from the Sun, where the two bodies’ gravity lets a spacecraft orbit the Sun at the same rate as Earth and so stay in the same relative position.
Can I see Webb from the ground?
Not with the naked eye. Large telescopes can detect it as an extremely faint point, but there is nothing to see visually.
Is Webb replacing Hubble?
No. Webb observes infrared light from L2; Hubble covers ultraviolet and visible light from low Earth orbit, and is still working. They see different light and answer different questions.
Which telescopes can I track here?
Anything in Earth orbit — including Hubble, Chandra and AstroSat, all of which have live pages on this site.