2026 Satellite Imagery Update: 37 Million km² at 30cm Resolution

If you've built anything on top of satellite imagery, you know the pain of inconsistent resolution. You zoom into one region and get crisp rooftops. Pan over to the next and it's a blurry patchwork from three years ago. That inconsistency isn't just cosmetic: it erodes trust in whatever you're building on top of it.

We regularly refresh our Alidade Satellite imagery as new high-resolution data becomes available from Airbus. This update is one of our most significant, expanding both the depth and freshness of our coverage.

30cm Coverage, Scaled

We now offer 37 million km² of 30cm-resolution satellite imagery, enough detail to distinguish individual vehicles, building footprints, and infrastructure at high zoom levels. For applications like urban planning tools, insurance assessments, or logistics platforms, this is the difference between useful and decorative.

This release also adds seamless 30cm country-wide mosaics for Japan, Nigeria, Mexico, the UAE, and Eastern South Africa. "Seamless" matters here: no visible tile boundaries, no abrupt shifts in color or season. Just consistent, high-resolution coverage across the entire country.

A Fresher Global Baseline

Beyond the 30cm expansion, we've completed a full refresh of our 1.5m-resolution dataset covering the Earth's landmasses, derived from the latest SPOT Global layer. Even at lower zoom levels, you're working with current data rather than imagery that's aging out.

Freshness matters as much as resolution. Across our entire dataset, the area-weighted average age is roughly 1.6 years. Nearly two-thirds of our coverage is less than a year old, and only 7% is older than three years. That share continues to shrink with each refresh.

Combined with our 2025 satellite imagery refresh, every pixel in our dataset is still 1.5m or better, with 37 million km² at 30cm and another 7 million km² at 50cm.

What This Means for Your Stack

If you're using Alidade Satellite, these updates are already live. No API changes, no migration. The same tile endpoints now serve fresher, sharper data. Integration works the same way it always has via MapLibre, Leaflet, OpenLayers, or any other mapping library that supports raster tiles.

We don't track or profile your end users. The imagery is delivered directly, with no behavioral tracking layer between your application and the tiles.

Try It

The updated satellite imagery is available now for all Stadia Maps customers. If you're new, create a free account and see the difference at zoom level 18.