Expert map tools.
Every map on this site has a tools menu. More expert tools opens a panel under the map: read a value from the NASA imagery, chart a point over time, summarise an area, compare two dates, export what you see. It all runs in your browser.
This page also carries the Natural Earth boundaries, lakes and place names that the globe view of every map here draws at small scales. The maps load them from this page on demand.
Nine tools, one panel under the map.
Each tool answers one question a reader asks of a map, and each export carries its credits.
| Tool | What it does |
|---|---|
| Value | Shows the value under the pointer with its units, product, sensor and date, or the class name on a classified map, and says when there is no data. |
| Time series | Select a point to chart the layer over the last 30, 90 or 365 days at the product's own dates, then download the readings as CSV. |
| Area | Draw a rectangle or a polygon, or use the page's region, for the mean, minimum, maximum and the share of the area above a threshold. |
| Swipe | Puts a second date or a second layer to the right of a divider you drag across the map. |
| Link | Copies a link that reopens the map with the same view, projection, layers and date. |
| Figure | Exports a PNG with a legend for each layer, the dates, the product names and the full credits. |
| QGIS | Writes a layer definition file (.qlr) for the active NASA layers at the date shown, and copies the WMTS capabilities address. |
| Code | Gives Python and R code that requests the same layer, date and area from NASA. |
| Your data | Shows a GeoJSON, KML, zipped Shapefile or GeoTIFF file of your own over the map, with its values or attributes on hover. |
Every value is an estimate within one colour step.
NASA publishes these layers as coloured images, each with a colour map that ties every colour to a range of values. The tools take the colour of a pixel, find its step in that colour map and report the middle of the step with the product's units. A value is therefore an estimate within one step, at the resolution of the current zoom, and areas are counted at screen resolution.
Transparent pixels and colours outside the colour map read as no data and are left out of every statistic. Image layers such as true colour carry no values. For analysis, use the product files from NASA; the Code and QGIS tools start you there.
Your own data stays in your browser.
A file you add is read inside the browser tab. It is not uploaded, stored or shared, and it is gone when you leave the page. A figure you export names your file in its credits as data not checked by us.
The tools request map images from NASA GIBS only, as the maps already do, and load themselves from this page on the same site. Before they run, the map checks that what it loaded matches the version it was built with, and it leaves the map unchanged if it does not.
Data from NASA, credited on every export.
Imagery comes from NASA Global Imagery Browse Services (GIBS), part of NASA's Earth Science Data and Information System. Each product is credited to its mission and date on the map and in every figure. Colours are redrawn in the site's palettes from the published colour maps. The tools compute no risk scores.
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