Astrophotography of the Day

The AOTD is not a competition with prizes. Its purpose is to celebrate the amateur astrophotography community and help remarkable images reach a wider audience.

• It promotes the output of the community and encourages excellence in a highly technical hobby.
• It is agnostic to subject (deep-sky, planetary, lunar, wide-field), equipment cost, location, or acquisition method.
• An image captured under city light pollution is judged on its own merits, the same as one from a dark-sky reserve.
• Selections are made by the community, for the community — no editorial jury decides the winner.

Any logged-in AstroBear member can vote for images they love. Voting is open and transparent — there is no submission queue or review panel.

• One vote per member per image. You can vote for as many different images as you like, but only once for each.
• You can change your mind — clicking the trophy again removes your vote.
• Votes are tallied each day in UTC. The image with the most votes cast during a given day becomes the AOTD for the following day.
• The winning image is featured at the top of the homepage for 24 hours.
• You cannot vote for your own images — the vote button is hidden on your own posts.

In the event of a tie, the image that reached the tied vote count earliest is selected. If no votes are cast on a given day, no new AOTD is selected and the previous day's feature remains.

When your image wins the AOTD, two things happen automatically:

• Your image is featured on the homepage banner as the Astrophotography of the Day.
• An AOTD Winner badge is added to your public profile, marked with a trophy icon.

Badges are permanent and accumulate — every daily win adds to your total, shown as "AOTD Winner ×N" on your profile. Winners are notified by email at the address on their account.

To keep the AOTD fair and authentic, the following rules apply:

1. Only your own work. You may only publish images you personally acquired, processed, or both. Re-uploading ready-made professional or space-telescope images is not permitted.
2. No re-submitting the same image. Re-processing or minor additions to an already-shared image should be uploaded as a revision, not re-entered for a new vote cycle. Substantially new data may be shared as a new image.
3. One image per team. If you collaborate on data, only one team member should share it; others can be tagged as collaborators.
4. No vote manipulation. Creating multiple accounts to vote, coordinating vote exchanges, or any other artificial inflation is prohibited and may result in removal of the image and loss of the badge.
5. AstroBear's discretion. AstroBear reserves the right to remove an image from the AOTD, strip its badge, or suspend a member from participation if these rules are broken.

AstroBear reserves the right to update these terms. Continued participation after a change constitutes acceptance of the revised terms.

Can I vote for my own image? No. The vote button is hidden on your own posts to keep the contest fair.

How often can I vote? You can vote for many different images, but only once per image. Removing a vote lets you reallocate it.

When is the winner announced? The daily winner is selected shortly after midnight UTC and featured for the following 24 hours.

Can I win more than once? Yes — every daily win adds a badge to your profile, so your trophy count grows over time.

Do I need to submit my image? No. Every image shared in the community feed is automatically eligible for voting.