Highest Resolution Ever
Delivering 31-cm resolution, WorldView-3 offers a level of clarity and detail never seen from a satellite before.
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WorldView-3 Satellite
Maxar's most sophisticated satellite with 30-cm resolution, 8-band imagery and 3.7-meter SWIR.
Sample imagery
WorldView-3 30-cm Natural Color–Long Beach, California, USA; November 11, 2021 View Full Size Image
The WorldView-3Â Advantage
The Most Spectral Bands
WorldView-3’s 29 spectral bands make this satellite the industry’s choice for spectral analysis. And with 14-bit, 8-band short-wave infrared, your mineral and hydrocarbon exploration has never been more accurate and targeted.
Huge Collection Capacity
Collecting an area larger than Afghanistan every day, the WorldView-3 archive grows by more than 240 million sq km each year.
Best Positional Accuracy
For projects requiring the best possible precision, there is no other choice than WorldView-3 with better than 3.5-m accuracy (CE90%; terrain dependent) even without ground control.
Overview & History
WorldView-3 is the younger, more sophisticated ‘satellite sister’ of Maxar Technologies’ WorldView-2. Launched into orbit from Vandenberg Air Force Base, California in 2014, WorldView-3 is now the world’s most technologically advanced high-resolution satellite. WorldView-3 collects 31-centimeter (cm) panchromatic, 1.24-meter (m) multispectral, 3.7-m shortwave infrared (SWIR) and 30-m CAVIS imagery. At a maximum 31-cm resolution, this imagery will rival the clarity of 20 to 25-cm aerial data given its superior optical and production systems.
Not only is WorldView-3 the highest resolution satellite ever launched, it features 29 spectral bands of remotely sensed data which is nearly 6 times more than any sensor–other than WorldView-2’s 9 bands that is. Boldly going where no satellite has gone before, WorldView-3 offers a high resolution panchromatic band and 8 multispectral bands which are ideal for visual analysis, bathymetric studies and plant health assessments; 8 short-wave infrared bands which are ideal for mineral and hydrocarbon exploration; and 12 CAVIS bands which are ideal for improved atmospheric corrections.
If your project demands the highest resolution imagery available and/or requires spectral analysis, then WorldView-3 should be your first choice. And with an archive that grows by nearly 680,000 square kilometers (sq km) per day, we are sure to have the imagery you need!
WorldView-3 Specifications
Launch Details
- Launch Date: August 13, 2014, at 18:30 UTC
- Vehicle: Atlas-V 401
- Site: Vandenberg Air Force Base, California
- Expected Mission Life: 7.25 years with estimated 10 to 12 year life span
WorldView-3 Components
- Dimensions: 5.7-m tall x 2.5-m across (7.1-m across with deployed solar arrays); 2,800 kg
- Power Systems: 3.1 kW 2-panel solar array; 100 Ahr battery
- Control Systems:
- 3-axis stabilized
- Actuators–control movement gyros (CMGs)
- Altitude determination–star trackers, precision inertial reference unit (IRU) and GPS
- Onboard Storage Capacity: 2199 Gb solid state drive with EDAC
- Ground Communication Systems:
- Imagery & metadata downlink–800 and 1,200 Mbps X-band
- Maintenance–4, 16, 32 or 64 kbps real time (524 kbps stored) X-band
- Commands–2 or 64 kbps S-band
- Focal Plane:
- 60 staggered panchromatic detector sub-arrays (DSAs)–42,500 pixels
- 12 staggered multispectral DSAs–10,651 pixels / band; either side of panchromatic array (MS1 array: blue, green, red and NIR-1; MS2 array: coastal, yellow, red edge, NIR-2)
- Optical Sensor Assembly: 16.0-m focal length, 1.1-m aperture, 1.1-m diameter primary mirror
Orbit Characteristics
- Altitude: 617 km
- Period: 97 minutes
- Inclination: 98°
- Direction: sun-synchronous circular, north to south (across the lit side of Earth)
- Equatorial Crossing Time: 10:30 AM local time (approximate; across lit side of Earth)
- Revisit Frequency: (at 40° lat)
- < 1 days (1-m GSD)
- 4.5 days (< 20° off-nadir)
Imaging System
- Spectral Bands:
- Panchromatic
- 8-band multispectral (coastal, blue, green, yellow, red, red edge, NIR-1 and NIR-2)
- 8-band shortwave infrared (SWIR)
- 12-band CAVIS (corrects for Clouds, Aerosols, Vapors, Ice and Snow)
- Sensor Resolution:
- At nadir–31-cm panchromatic, 1.24-m multispectral, 3.7-m SWIR and 30.0-m CAVIS
- 20° off-nadir–34-cm panchromatic, 1.38-m multispectral, 4.1-m SWIR and ~33-m CAVIS
- Panchromatic and Multispectral Bands Wavelength Range: (in nm)
- Panchromatic–450 to 800
- Coastal–400 to 450
- Blue–450 to 510
- Green–510 to 580
- Yellow–585 to 625
- Red–630 to 690
- Red edge–705 to 745
- NIR-1–770 to 895
- NIR-2–860 to 1040
- SWIR Bands Wavelength Range: (in nm)
- SWIR-1–1195 to 1225
- SWIR-2–1550 to 1590
- SWIR-3–1640 to 1680
- SWIR-4–1710 to 1750
- SWIR-5–2145 to 2185
- SWIR-6–2185 to 2225
- SWIR-7–2235 to 2285
- SWIR-8–2295 to 2365
- CAVIS Bands Wavelength Range: (in nm)
- Desert clouds–405 to 420
- Aerosol-1–459 to 509
- Green–525 to 585
- Aerosol-2–635 to 685
- Water-1–845 to 885
- Water-2–897 to 927
- Water-3–930 to 965
- NDVI-SWIR–1220 to 1252
- Cirrus–1365 to 1405
- Snow–1620 to 1680
- Aerosol-3–2105 to 2245
- Aerosol-3–2105 to 2245 (Aerosol-3 bands have same wavelength but opposing parallax to estimate cloud heights)
- Dynamic Range: 11-bits, panchromatic and multispectral); 14-bits, SWIR and CAVIS
Collection Capabilities
- Footprint Width: 13.1 km (at nadir); 10 km (SWIR at nadir)
- Single Pass Maximum Collection Geometry: (at 30° off-nadir)
- Mono–66.5 km x 112 km (5 strip wide)
- Stereo–26.6 km x 112 km (2 pairs wide)
- Retargeting Ability: 12 sec (time to slew 200 km)
- Daily Collection Capacity: 680,000 sq km
- Georeferenced Horizontal Accuracy: < 3.5-m CE90 (global average, dependent on terrain)
Pricing
Below is the least expensive WorldView-3 data offered. Prices increase for new collections and data processing. Note that academic and volume discounts are available.
Data Source
archive
Minimum Order Size
25 sq km (per area & date)
Product Type
30-cm georeferenced + natural color or 4-band (50-cm is offered at a discounted rate)
Price Per Sq Km
Completing an atmospheric correction and/or radiance conversion of WorldView-3 imagery?
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