Sunlit Earth

Name: Sunlit Earth — Download free. Realistic Earth wallpaper
Availability: InStock
Rating: 5 (1 reviews)
Author: Sebastian Straub

Sunlit Earth — Free Download. Realistic Earth wallpaper

Sunlit Earth is a desktop application that renders a realistic view of Earth from space and sets it as your wallpaper. The program displays current sunlight, city lights, cloud cover, and astronomical objects at their correct positions. It updates the wallpaper automatically throughout the day, showing the planet as it appears at the present moment. Users can adjust the camera angle, zoom level, and visual effects to compose the desired scene.

★★★★★

5.0(1 ratings)

Download Sunlit Earth (Official links)

File size: 17 MB

The latest version of Sunlit Earth is: 0.2.2

Operating system: Windows, Mac OS, Linux

Languages: English

Developer: Sebastian Straub

Price: $0.00 USD (Free product)

Custom camera controls. This function provides full control over the viewing angle and position of the virtual camera. Users can drag the globe with the left mouse button to rotate it, scroll to zoom in or out, and use the right mouse button to shift the image within the frame. The middle mouse button changes the camera view direction, while dragging with both left and right buttons rotates the camera around the scene. Presets offer quick starting views for common compositions, and the Advanced panel gives precise numeric controls for camera position, framing, and orientation.
Automatic wallpaper updates. The application refreshes the desktop background at regular intervals to reflect the current date and time. Sunlight and city lights shift according to real-world solar illumination, so the terminator line between day and night moves across the globe correctly. Users can enable or disable automatic refresh and control how often the wallpaper updates. The desktop shows a still image between updates, and the preview window lets users compose the next scene before applying it.
Satellite cloud imagery. Recent satellite cloud data is downloaded automatically and overlaid on top of detailed NASA surface textures. This shows changing weather patterns in near real time, with imagery usually less than three hours old. The cloud layer is cached for later use, and internet access is required to obtain fresh clouds. The bundled surface textures and astronomical calculations work offline, so the globe remains visible even without a connection.
Astronomical object rendering. The Sun, Moon, planets, visible stars, and the Milky Way are rendered at their astronomically correct positions for the chosen date and time. This includes proper placement of constellations and the galactic plane. Users can adjust the apparent size and brightness of celestial objects through the Advanced settings. The astronomy library computes positions independently of the rendering engine, which supports image export and automated testing.
Multi-monitor support. Wallpapers fit the user's monitor layout, with support for mirrored views or continuous panoramas across multiple displays. The Displays mode and anchor settings let users choose how the scene is distributed across screens. A command-line tool, sunlit-earth displays, inspects the detected layout without changing the wallpaper. This helps diagnose problems when the wrong screen or arrangement is used.
Adjustable visual parameters. Every visual aspect of the scene can be modified, including camera position, lighting, atmospheric effects, cloud opacity, and the apparent size and brightness of celestial objects. The Advanced panel provides sliders and numeric fields for these adjustments. A date and time override allows rendering scenes from the past or future. Changes are saved when the user clicks Set as Wallpaper, and Reset reloads the last saved configuration.
Image export. The application renders PNG images without opening the settings window, using the command sunlit-earth render with options for output path, width, and height. The exported image uses the saved configuration and is rendered at the specified resolution, which may differ from the preview window. On Windows the executable is sunlit-earth.exe, and on Linux it is ./sunlit-earth when run from its folder. Help is available through sunlit-earth --help and sunlit-earth render --help.
Texture resolution control. The default globe texture resolution is 4096 pixels wide. Under Advanced, Rendering, users can choose 2048 to reduce memory use or 8192 for more surface detail. This setting also selects the cloud download resolution. Rendering happens on the GPU by default, and if no supported GPU or video driver is available, the application falls back to software rendering, which is slower but produces similar quality.
Configuration and cache management. Settings, caches, and generated wallpapers are stored in platform-specific directories: ~/.local/share/SunlitEarth on Linux, %LOCALAPPDATA%\SunlitEarth on Windows, and ~/Library/Application Support/SunlitEarth on macOS. The settings file is config.toml, which can be backed up before experimenting. This organization keeps user data separate from the application binary and simplifies troubleshooting.
Command-line interface. The application provides command-line options for rendering images, inspecting display layouts, and launching in different modes. The --software-rendering flag forces software rendering when GPU rendering fails. The --mode window option launches the app without a tray icon, which is helpful on desktop sessions that do not support tray integration. The render subcommand supports custom output paths and resolutions.
Tray integration. When the main window is closed, the application minimizes to the system tray and continues running in the background. Users can right-click the tray icon to exit the program or reopen the settings window. Tray support depends on the desktop session, and if no tray is available, the app can be launched with --mode window instead. This design keeps automatic wallpaper updates active without keeping a window open.
Preset and profile system. Presets provide starting views for common compositions, such as a full globe, a close-up of a continent, or a view centered on the terminator. Users can save their own settings by clicking Set as Wallpaper, and Reset restores the last saved configuration. Load Defaults restores the application's default values in the window. Planned features include saving and loading custom profiles for different scenes.

Sunlit Earth was created by Sebastian Straub in Germany, with the project starting in 2026. It was built as an alternative to DesktopEarth and Xplanet, both of which the developer used for years but which appear to be abandoned. The program is written in Rust, using wgpu for rendering and Slint for the user interface. The rendering engine can run without a window, which supports image export and automated testing. The codebase is organized into crates: sunlit-core for rendering, shaders, astronomy, assets, configuration, and the engine; sunlit-app for the settings window, tray, command-line interface, and application integration; and xtask for asset preparation, VM tooling, and release builds. Most of the code was written with the help of AI tools, and the developer shares this openly so users can decide for themselves whether to trust the implementation.