Skip to main content
Cesium Mars for hero

Cesium Mars

A Complete, Readily Accessible 3D Dataset of Mars

Cesium Mars is complete 3D Tiles of the Martian surface that enables 3D visualizations, simulations, and analytics to support advanced digital twin creation. Cesium Mars combines terrain captured by NASA's Mars Global Surveyor spacecraft and the European Space Agency's Mars Express spacecraft with the Mars Viking Colorized Global Mosaic imagery into a single tileset. 

Get access to Cesium Mars

Sign up for a Cesium ion account to use this 3D tileset in your custom applications.

Asset Specs

Format: 3D Tiles

Coverage: Mars

CRS: IAU_2015:49901

Resolution:

CoverageApproximate resolution in meters
Global imagery232 m
Global terrain200 m
Jezero crater imagery6 m
Jezero crater terrain20 m
Gale crater imagery25 cm
Gale crater terrain1 m

CesiumJS Code Example

// Set the default ellipsoid to Mars instead of WGS84
Cesium.Ellipsoid.default = Cesium.Ellipsoid.MARS;

const viewer = new Cesium.Viewer("cesiumContainer", {
  // This is a global 3D Tiles tileset so disable the
  // globe to prevent it from interfering with the data
  globe: false,
  // 2D and Columbus View are not currently supported
  // for global 3D Tiles tilesets
  sceneModePicker: false,
  // Don't use Earth imagery layers for other celestial bodies 
  baseLayerPicker: false,
  // Geocoder is not supported for locations on Mars
  geocoder: false,
});

try {
  const tileset = await Cesium.Cesium3DTileset.fromIonAssetId(3644333);
  viewer.scene.primitives.add(tileset);
} catch (error) {
  console.log(error);
}

Cesium ion Self-Hosted

If your enterprise deployment requires the use of Cesium Mars in your own environment, let's talk.

Terms of use and attribution requirements

To learn about the terms of use and attribution requirements for Cesium Mars, see the Cesium ion Terms of Service, Cesium Global 3D Content, and the Content Usage and Attribution Guide.

Sources

CoverageSourceAttribution
Global imageryMars Viking Colorized Global Mosaic 232mNASA and the USGS Astrogeology Science Center
Global terrainMars MGS MOLA - MEX HRSC Blended DEM Global 200NASA and the USGS Astrogeology Science Center
Jezero crater imageryCTX Orthoimage of Candidate Mars 2020 Landing Site Jezero WestNASA and the USGS Astrogeology Science Center
Jezero crater terrainMars 2020 Terrain Relative Navigation CTX DTM MosaicNASA and the USGS Astrogeology Science Center
Gale crater imageryMars MSL Gale Merged Orthophoto Mosaic 25cmNASA and the USGS Astrogeology Science Center
Gale crater terrainMars MSL Gale Merged DEM 1m NASA and the USGS Astrogeology Science Center

In the areas of the Mars Jezero and Gale craters, this dataset combines high-resolution grayscale TIFF with the global lower-resolution color TIFF to generate a colorized high-res image. For the red channel, the grayscale values were used from the higher res imagery. Then, using the average green and blue values from the low-res image, green/red and blue/red ratios were calculated and applied to the grayscale to estimate the green and blue channels. Finally, a fill was applied to color black pixels in the high-resolution imagery resulting from areas where no data was present.

Looking for more 3D content?

We've curated global terrain, 3D buildings, and satellite imagery ready to use in custom applications.