Southern Taurid meteor shower 2025: All you need to know

The Southern Taurid meteor shower will be active from September 20 to November 20, 2025, and will peak on the night of November 4-5, according to the American Meteor Society.

The Southern Taurid meteor shower occurs when Earth passes through the debris of ice and dust left behind by the comet 2P/Encke.

Southern Taurid meteor shower in 2025

When to see: The Southern Taurid radiant—the point from which the meteors appear to radiate—rises in the early evening, reaches its highest point in the sky around midnight, and sets in the early morning. So the shower will be best visible around midnight on November 5, 2025, when the radiant climbs high in the sky.

The Southern Taurid meteor shower has a broad, flat peak that overlaps with the Northern Taurids, which peak about a week later, on the night of November 11–12, 2025. You can therefore expect a fairly steady rate of Taurid meteors—around 10 per hour—for roughly two weeks, from late October to early November.

Where to look: Look high in the southern sky around midnight to see the constellation Taurus, from which the Southern Taurid meteor shower radiates.

Orange-red Aldebaran—the brightest star in the constellation Taurus, the Bull—will help you identify the constellation. It is easily visible even from light-polluted areas. The radiant of the Southern Taurid meteor shower is located to the right of bright Aldebaran.

Expected meteors during peak activity: The Southern Taurids are a modest shower, producing around 5 meteors per hour during peak activity under ideal conditions.

However, this rate doubles (to about 10 meteors per hour) when its peak overlaps with the Northern Taurids.

Moon phase during peak activity: The moon will be in the full moon phase and 100% illuminated during peak activity. As the full moon rises around sunset and is visible all night, the moonlight will interfere with the Southern Taurids in 2025.

Visibility of the shower: The Southern Taurid meteor shower will be equally favorable for observers in both hemispheres, especially those located in the low-northern latitudes (from 5°N to 20°N).

Observers located in low northern latitudes will see about 98% of the shower’s activity, as the radiant climbs almost overhead (about 80° above the horizon) around midnight.

The Taurid swarm

A typical meteoroid stream consists mainly of dust no bigger than a grain of sand. However, the Taurid meteoroid stream is embedded with swarms of larger particles—up to the size of small pebbles—which produce numerous brilliant, beautiful fireballs at intervals of 3, 4, or 7 years, known as the Taurid swarm years.

Swarm years occur because the Taurid meteoroid stream is in a 7:2 resonance with Jupiter, which produces concentrations of material that encounter Earth at 3-, 4-, and 7-year intervals.

Here is the list of the Taurid swarm years between 2020 and 2049 (swarm years are highlighted in red):

Normally, fireballs make up about 1% of all Taurids, but in swarm years, it can be anywhere between 2.4% and, exceptionally, 11%.

What makes the Taurid fireballs doubly impressive is their relatively slow passage, traveling across the sky at speeds between 26.1 km/s and 28.7 km/s — the slowest of the major meteor showers.

According to the American Meteor Society, 2025 is a swarm year, so you can expect an enhanced rate of fireball activity for about two weeks, from late October to early November, centered around the peak night of November 4–5, 2025.

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