A tracking telescope keeps an object in the eyepiece while the Earth turns, and it is the piece of automation that most changes what an evening feels like, because you stop nudging the tube and start looking through it.
Which telescope do I need? Ask us below
What untracked observing is actually like
At a hundred times magnification an object crosses the field of view in well under a minute, so an undriven instrument means a nudge every thirty seconds. Most people stop noticing within a week and it never entirely stops being a distraction, particularly when you want to study fine planetary detail or show somebody else the view.
What a drive costs and gives
On an equatorial mount, a single motor turning the polar axis is often a cheap add-on and it removes the nudging completely. On an alt-azimuth mount two motors and a computer are needed, which is why driven alt-azimuth instruments are always computerised and always cost more than the equivalent manual ones.
The auto tracking telescope: smart and motorised instruments
Smart telescopes and computerised instruments track as a matter of course, since they must in order to stack exposures or hold an object for a viewer. On those the tracking is not a separate purchase and not a separate decision, and its accuracy is set by the mount underneath rather than by the software.
Where tracking stops being enough
For long exposure photography, tracking has to be accurate to a couple of arcseconds, which almost no visual mount achieves unaided. That is where autoguiding begins, and it is the point at which a tracking telescope becomes an imaging setup with a very different budget.
Questions people ask about telescope
What is a tracking telescope?
One whose mount turns to follow the sky, keeping an object in the eyepiece without manual nudging.
Do I need a tracking telescope?
Not for casual visual observing. It becomes valuable at high magnification, for showing others, and it is essential for long exposure photography.
How does an automatic telescope track?
The mount following the sky automatically after alignment, which computerised and smart telescopes do as standard.