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JMA Volcano Watch Cameras: 49 Live Cameras in Japan

The Japan Meteorological Agency points 49 cameras at the volcanoes it keeps under watch, across 21 prefectures. Every one refreshes every two minutes.

What you can see

These 49 cameras were not put up to show you scenery. The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) keeps a standing watch on the country's active volcanoes, and these are the cameras it aims at their summits and craters. Most sit several kilometres out at the foot of the mountain and pull the peak in with a long lens, which means that on a bad day the mountain disappears from the frame altogether.

There are 49 of them, over 21 prefectures. Hokkaido has nine, more than anywhere else, and Tokyo has six — none of them near the city. Tokyo's six are all island volcanoes: Izu Oshima, Niijima, Kozushima, Miyakejima, Hachijojima and Aogashima. Kagoshima's five run south from Sakurajima through Satsuma Iojima, Kuchinoerabujima, Nakanoshima and Suwanosejima.

What is in the frame varies a great deal by mountain. On the cameras where the plume shows — Mount Aso, Sakurajima, Suwanosejima — a white streak stands over the crater and leans with the wind. On the cameras pointed at water in a crater — the Okama at Mount Zao, Mount Kusatsu-Shirane — one patch of the slope is a different colour from everything around it. The rest show no steam and no lake, just the shape of a mountain. Nothing happening is the normal state, and a watch camera that shows nothing is doing its job.

Every frame has the date and time burned into it. The digits in the corner tell you how old the picture in front of you is.

Cameras you can watch now: 49

All 49 are still images. Tap one to open it in the camera list.

When to watch

They refresh every two minutes — far shorter than the hour that most scenery cameras take. What you open is within a couple of minutes of now. They are stills, so nothing moves, but wait a little and reload and the picture has changed.

Daylight only. These are visible-light cameras, so the frame goes close to black after sunset. For plumes, try morning or late afternoon: with the light coming in from the side, white smoke lifts away from the sky and the slope behind it.

High peaks start growing cloud before noon. The summit stays visible far longer early in the day, so open these early if you want a clean outline.

In winter, snow lying on the slope makes gullies and crater rims easier to read. Where the snow refuses to settle, the ground underneath is warm.

If it isn't showing

This page is a wall of pictures and nothing more. Eruption warning levels, access restrictions and evacuation information are not written here. Before you go anywhere near one of these mountains, read what the JMA itself publishes; the provider link on each card goes to the agency's own page.

Several of these mountains have other cameras on this site, looking from other directions. Sakurajima, Mount Aso, Okama, Mount Zao and Mount Fuji set the agency's camera beside other operators'.

By area: The Volcanoes of Tohoku, The Izu Islands, The Satsunan Volcanic Islands. For the steam and the hot ground themselves, Geothermal Areas; for water standing in a crater, Volcanic lakes. Every volcano camera on the site, in Japan and abroad, is in Volcanoes, and reading a volcano camera is written up on its own.

Where to find JMA Volcano Watch Cameras

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 all 450 cameras by format, region, subject and provider.