Seattle, WA's night sky, measured from orbit

Seattle reads as inner-city on this dataset's scale. Among the brightest skies in this dataset. Usually just the Moon and a few of the brightest stars or planets cut through. That's brighter than 98.8% of the 3,206 US cities in this dataset.

Note the source: a satellite reading of upward light, not a visual Bortle scale reading. The two measure related but different things.

How far Seattle is from a meaningfully darker sky

Mercer Island, WA, about 7 miles away as the crow flies, measures in the rural band, one step darker than Seattle. Actual driving distance will run longer than that straight-line figure.

Mercer Island, WA is itself still a measured city, not a designated dark-sky park, this only compares against the 3,206 places this dataset covers.

How Seattle compares nationally

Seattle, WA has a population of about 780,995, one of 3,206 US cities of 10,000 or more residents in this dataset. Seattle places 3,150 of 3,206 cities in this dataset's darkest-to-brightest order.