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Mount Asama: 2 Live Cameras in Japan

An active volcano on the Gunma–Nagano border, on two cameras: a monitoring camera and a scenery camera from Tsumagoi. The long skirt and the summit vents, at two distances.

What you can see

Asama is an active volcano well inland in the Kanto region, still venting from the summit. Lava from the great Tenmei eruption of 1783 is still there on the northern foot as the Onioshidashi lava field.

The Meteorological Agency camera exists to watch the crater, so it frames tight on the mountain. Mount Asama from Tsumagoi is the Environment Ministry's scenery camera, set back far enough to take in the whole gentle skirt. Use the second for the shape of the mountain, the first to check whether it is venting.

Asama does not throw up a plume the way Sakurajima does. It is usually a thin haze drifting slowly off the summit area — easy to see as white on a cold morning, and lost against the sky in the middle of the day.

Cameras you can watch now: 2

All 2 are still images. Tap one to open it in the camera list.

When to watch

Winter mornings are the most reliable. Asama does not take especially deep snow, but what settles leaves streaks along the slope that make the shape of the ground easy to read. The air is dry too, so the outline holds even from a distance.

For the vents, come when it is coldest — around dawn. The same volume of water vapour condenses whiter the colder it is, and thins away to nothing once the sun is up.

Summer afternoons build thunderclouds, and the mountain can vanish entirely. From mid to late October the deciduous trees on the lower slopes turn and the colour of the whole frame changes.

If it isn't showing

These cameras exist to watch a volcano, so they are not built to make the view look good. Both are stills, and neither shows anything at night. Whether the plume is visible depends on the wind, and on many days the summit spends longer inside cloud than out of it.

Asama sits on the Nagano border, but both of these cameras look at it from the Gunma side. Nothing films it from Nagano at present.

Gunma has a second continuously monitored volcano, Mount Kusatsu-Shirane. And if it is the snow you are waiting for, both of these cameras appear under First Snowcap as well.

Where to find Mount Asama

Agencies publishing the cameras on this page

The footage belongs to each agency. This site is an unofficial guide, and each sample frame was copied once per camera under that agency's terms of use.

To find other cameras, go to the camera list. You can narrow the cameras by format, region, subject and provider.