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VNTG — frequently asked questions
Last updated 2026-08-06
VNTG is a free satellite and aerial imagery viewer. It checks about 35 free sources and shows the sharpest one covering the point you pick, with its capture date, historical imagery back to 2014, live fire and weather overlays, and georeferenced downloads. No account is needed.
- Is VNTG free?
- Yes — entirely free, with no account, no signup and no ads. It serves publicly available imagery from government and open programmes, plus licensed free basemaps.
- How is it sharper than Google Maps?
- Google Maps satellite view is typically about 30 cm per pixel. Many countries publish their own aerial surveys free: the Netherlands at ~8 cm, Luxembourg and Switzerland at ~10 cm, ten German states at ~20 cm. VNTG checks ~35 such sources and serves whichever is sharpest for the exact point you click.
- What resolution can I actually get?
- It depends on location. Best case is 5–10 cm per pixel over the Netherlands, Luxembourg and Switzerland. Much of Germany, Czechia, Slovakia, Belgium, Austria, France and Spain sits at 10–25 cm. Everywhere else falls back to roughly 30 cm from Esri, or 10 m from Sentinel-2.
- How recent is the imagery?
- Aerial imagery is usually months to a couple of years old. For recency, VNTG reports the latest Sentinel-2 pass for any point — typically 2–3 days old over Europe — and can render it. NASA's daily mosaics give a near-same-day view at 250 m.
- Can I see a specific past date?
- Yes. Esri Wayback provides every release of Esri's World Imagery since 2014, selectable by date, so you can watch a location change year by year.
- Can I download the images?
- Yes — as a GeoTIFF (EPSG:3857, embedded geotags) or a PNG with a world file, both ready for QGIS or ArcGIS. Google and Yandex imagery is viewable only, because their terms don't permit redistribution.
- Do you show live wildfires and weather?
- Yes. Active fire detections come from NASA FIRMS with fire radiative power, brightness and acquisition time per detection. Live cloud imagery comes from GOES and Himawari, and precipitation radar from RainViewer.
- Where does the imagery come from?
- National mapping agencies (PDOK, swisstopo, IGN, German state surveys, ČÚZK, ZBGIS and others), Esri World Imagery, Copernicus Sentinel-2, and NASA. Every source is credited on the map and named in the panel.
- Is there an API?
- Not publicly yet. The engine is a Python package with a CLI, and an API is on the roadmap depending on demand.
- Do you track me?
- No. VNTG records an anonymous visit count and an aggregate of viewed areas rounded to about a kilometre. No IP addresses, names or per-user trails are stored, and nothing is sold.