Technologies

Missed the Solar Eclipse? How to Stream the Recap and Prepare for the Next Eclipse

The great American eclipse was the last total solar eclipse that will be visible over North America for 20 years. But there will be others across the globe.

The «great American eclipse» graced our skies on Monday, and if you let this rare celestial event pass you by, it’ll be quite a wait for the next one. Another total solar eclipse over North America won’t happen until 2044. The good news is you can rewatch the event with footage from the best vantage points, check out all the stunning photos of the eclipse and start preparing to see the next one.

A total solar eclipse happens when the moon passes between the Earth and the sun, blocking the sun and turning an otherwise sunny day to darkness for a short period of time. Depending on the angle at which you’re viewing the eclipse, you may see the sun completely shrouded by the moon (called totality) or some variation of it. The more off-angle you are and the farther you are from the path of the eclipse, the less likely you’ll be to see the totality.

The 2024 total solar eclipse reached the Mexican Pacific coast on April 8 at 11:07 a.m. PT (2:07 p.m. ET), and then traversed the US in a northeasterly direction from Texas to Maine and on into easternmost Canada.

If you weren’t in that path of totality, here are a look at some of the options to rewatch it online, or where you’ll have to travel for the next eclipse.

Total Solar Eclipse 2024: The Best Photos We’ve Seen

+11 More

See all photos

Total solar eclipse path in 2024

The eclipse crossed over the Pacific coast of Mexico and headed northeast over mainland Mexico. The eclipse made its way over San Antonio at approximately 2:30 p.m. ET on April 8 and moved through Texas, over the southeastern part of Oklahoma and northern Arkansas by 2:50 p.m. ET.

By 3 p.m. ET, the eclipse was over southern Illinois, and just 5 minutes later, was traveling over Indianapolis. Folks in northwestern Ohio were treated to the eclipse around 3:15 p.m. ET, and it then traveled over Lake Erie and Buffalo, New York, at around 3:20 p.m. ET. Over the following 10 minutes, the eclipse was seen over northern New York state, then over Vermont. By 3:35 p.m. ET, the eclipse worked its way into Canada and off the eastern coast of North America.

How to rewatch the solar eclipse online

NASA hosted a three-hour live stream of the eclipse, which included commentary by NASA experts, astronauts on the international space station, celebrities and looks at watch parties across the nation. It featured views from locations in the path of totality, including Dallas and Kerrville, Texas; Russellville, Arkansas; NASA’s Glenn Research Center in Ohio; Indianapolis; Carbondale, Illinois; Niagara Falls, New York; and Houlton, Maine.

You can rewatch the live broadcast on streaming service NASA Plus or on NASA’s website, or rewatch the stream on CNET’s YouTube channel.

Where and when is the next solar eclipse?

While the next total solar eclipse won’t be visible over North America for 20 years, there will be other partial, annular and total eclipses across the world. Here are the next five:

Oct. 2, 2024: An annular solar eclipse, visible from South America; and a partial eclipse, visible in South America, Antarctica, the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean and North America.
March 29, 2025: A partial solar eclipse, visible from Europe, Asia, North America, South America, Africa, the Atlantic Ocean and the Arctic Ocean.
Sept. 21, 2025: A partial solar eclipse, visible in Australia, Antarctica, the Pacific Ocean and the Atlantic Ocean.
Feb. 17, 2026: An annular solar eclipse, visible in Antarctica; and a partial eclipse, visible in Antarctica, Africa, South America, the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean and the Indian Ocean.
Aug. 12, 2026: The next total solar eclipse will be visible from Greenland, Iceland, Spain, Russia and a small area of Portugal; a partial eclipse will be visible from Europe, Africa, North America, the Atlantic Ocean, the Arctic Ocean and the Pacific Ocean.

Best places to watch an eclipse

When evaluating the best places to watch one of those upcoming eclipses, you’ll first want to determine where you’ll have the best angle to see the totality. The farther off-angle you are — in other words, the farther north or south of the eclipse’s path — the less of an impact you can expect.

Therefore, if you want to have the best chance of experiencing the eclipse, you’ll want to be in its path. When the eclipses come closer, check for details on what cities will have the best vantage points.

Eclipse eye safety and photography

When preparing for the next solar eclipses, it’s critical you keep eye safety in mind.

During an eclipse, and especially during the periods before and after totality, don’t look directly at the sun without special eye protection. Also, be sure not to look at the sun through a camera (including the camera on your phone), binoculars, a telescope or any other viewing device. This could cause serious eye injury. Sunglasses aren’t enough to protect your eyes from damage.

If you want to view the eclipse, you’ll instead need solar viewing glasses that comply with the ISO 12312-2 safety standard. Anything that doesn’t meet that standard or greater won’t be dark enough to protect your eyes.

If you don’t have eclipse viewing glasses handy, you can instead use indirect methods for viewing the eclipse, like a pinhole projector.

Read more: A Photographer’s Adventure With the Eclipse

In the event you want to take pictures of the eclipse, attach a certified solar filter to your camera. Doing so will protect your eyes and allow you to take photos while you view the eclipse through your lens.

There’s also a new app to help you both protect your eyes and take better photos of the eclipse on your phone. Solar Snap, designed by a former Hubble Space Telescope astronomer, comes with a Solar Snap camera filter that attaches to the back of an iPhone or Android phone, along with solar eclipse glasses for protecting your eyesight during the event. After you attach the filter to your phone, you can use the free Solar Snap Eclipse app to zoom in on the eclipse, adjust exposure and other camera settings, and ultimately take better shots of the eclipse.

2024 eclipse compared to 2017

The previous total solar eclipse occurred in 2017, and many Americans had a great view. Although there are plenty of similarities between the 2017 total solar eclipse and the one on April 8, there were a handful of differences. Mainly, the 2024 eclipse covered more land and lasted longer.

The 2017 eclipse started over the northwest US and moved southeast. Additionally, that eclipse’s path was up to 71 miles wide, compared with a maximum width of 122 miles for this year’s eclipse. Perhaps most importantly, the moon completely covered the sun for just 2 minutes, 40 seconds in 2017. This year, maximum totality lasted for nearly four-and-a-half minutes.

For more on the Great American Eclipse, check out CNET’s coverage on expert eye protection and viewing tips, where to get free solar eclipse glasses, how to figure out if your eclipse glasses are safe or fake and whether your solar panels will be affected by the total solar eclipse.

Technologies

Google races to put Gemini at the center of Android before Apple’s AI reboot

Google is using its latest Android rollout to position Gemini as the AI layer across phones, Chrome, laptops and cars.

Google is using its latest Android rollout to make Gemini less of a chatbot and more of an operating layer across the phone, browser, car and laptop, just weeks before Apple is expected to show its own Gemini-powered Apple Intelligence reboot at WWDC.
Ahead of its Google I/O developer conference next week, the company previewed a number of Android updates, including AI-powered app automation, a smarter version of Chrome on Android, new tools for creators, a redesigned Android Auto experience, and a sweeping set of new security features.
Alphabet is counting on Gemini to help Google compete directly with OpenAI and Anthropic in the market for artificial intelligence models and services, while also serving as the AI backbone across its expansive portfolio of products, including Android. Meanwhile, Gemini is powering part of Apple’s new AI strategy, giving Google a role in the iPhone maker’s reset even as it races to prove its own version of personal AI on the phone is further along.
Sameer Samat, who oversees Google’s Android ecosystem, told CNBC that Google is rebuilding parts of Android around Gemini Intelligence to help users complete everyday tasks more easily.
“We’re transitioning from an operating system to an intelligence system,” he said.
As part of Tuesday’s announcements. Google said Gemini Intelligence will be able to move across apps, understand what’s on the screen and complete tasks that would normally require a user to jump between multiple services. That means Android is moving beyond the traditional assistant model, where users ask a question and get an answer, and acting more like an agent.
For instance, Google says Gemini can pull relevant information from Gmail, build shopping carts and book reservations. Samat gave the example of asking Gemini to look at the guest list for a barbecue, build a menu, add ingredients to an Instacart list and return for approval before checkout.
A big concern surrounding agentic AI involves software taking action on a user’s behalf without permissions. Samat said Gemini will come back to the user before completing a transaction, adding, “the human is always in the loop.”
Four months after announcing its Gemini deal with Google, Apple is under pressure to show a more capable version of Apple Intelligence, which has been a relative laggard on the market. Apple has long framed privacy, hardware integration and control of the user experience as its advantages.
Google’s Android push is designed to show it can bring AI deeper into the device experience while still giving users control over what Gemini can see, where it can act and when it needs confirmation.
The app automation features will roll out in waves, starting with the latest Samsung Galaxy and Google Pixel phones this summer, before expanding across more Android devices, including watches, cars, glasses and laptops later this year.
The company is also redesigning Android Auto around Gemini, turning the car into another major surface for its assistant. Android Auto is in more than 250 million cars, and Google says the new release includes its biggest maps update in a decade and Gemini-powered help with tasks like ordering dinner while driving.
Alphabet’s AI strategy has been embraced by Wall Street, which has pushed the company’s stock price up more than 140% in the past year, compared to Apple’s roughly 40% gain. Investors now want to see how Gemini can become more central to the products people use every day.
WATCH: Alphabet briefly tops Nvidia after report of $200 billion Anthropic cloud deal

Technologies

Waymo recalls 3,800 robotaxis after glitch allowed some vehicles to ‘drive into standing water’

Waymo issued a voluntary recall of about 3,800 of its robotaxis to fix software issues that could allow them to drive into flooded roadways.

Waymo is recalling about 3,800 robotaxis in the U.S. to fix software issues that could allow them to “drive onto a flooded roadway,” according to a letter on the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration’s website.
The voluntary recall is for Waymo vehicles that use the company’s fifth and sixth generation automated driving systems (or ADS), the U.S. auto safety regulator said in the letter posted Tuesday.
Waymo autonomous vehicles in Austin, Texas, were seen on camera driving onto a flooded street and stalling, requiring other drivers to navigate around them. It’s the latest example of a safety-related issue for the Alphabet-owned AV unit that’s rapidly bolstering its fleet of vehicles and entering new U.S. markets.
Waymo has drawn criticism for its vehicles failing to yield to school buses in Austin, and for the performance of its vehicles during widespread power outages in San Francisco in December, when robotaxis halted in traffic, causing gridlock.
The company said in a statement on Tuesday that it’s “identified an area of improvement regarding untraversable flooded lanes specific to higher-speed roadways,” and opted to file a “voluntary software recall” with the NHTSA.
“Waymo provides over half a million trips every week in some of the most challenging driving environments across the U.S., and safety is our primary priority,” the company said.
Waymo added that it’s working on “additional software safeguards” and has put “mitigations” in place, limiting where its robotaxis operate during extreme weather, so that they avoid “areas where flash flooding might occur” in periods of intense rain.
WATCH: Waymo launches new autonomous system in Chinese-made vehicle

Technologies

Qualcomm tumbles 13% as semiconductor stocks retreat from historic AI-fueled surge

Semiconductor equities reversed sharply after a broad AI-driven advance, with Qualcomm suffering its worst day since 2020 amid inflation concerns and rising oil prices.

Semiconductor stocks fell sharply on Tuesday, reversing course after an extensive rally that had expanded the artificial intelligence investment theme well past Nvidia and driven the industry to unprecedented levels.

Qualcomm plunged 13% and was on track for its steepest single-day decline since 2020. Intel shed 8%, while On Semiconductor and Skyworks Solutions each lost more than 6%. The iShares Semiconductor ETF, which benchmarks the overall sector, fell 5%.

The sell-off came after a key gauge of consumer prices came in above forecasts, and as conflict in Iran pushed crude oil higher—prompting investors to shift away from riskier assets.

The preceding advance had widened the AI opportunity set beyond longtime industry leader Nvidia, which for much of the past several years had largely carried the market to new peaks on its own.

Explosive appetite for central processing units, along with the graphics processing units that power large language models, has sent chipmakers to all-time highs.

Market participants are wagering that the shift from AI model training to autonomous agents will lift demand for additional AI hardware. Among the beneficiaries are memory chip producers, which are raising prices as supply remains tight.

Micron Technology slid 6%, and Sandisk cratered 8%. Sandisk’s stock has surged more than six times over since January.