Italy Is Always Moving Screensaver
The Italy Is Always Moving screensaver shows every earthquake located by Italy's Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, key-less. The network is dense enough to catch things nobody feels — a quiet hour here is one with fewer than about three earthquakes. It's free, runs in your browser, and ESC exits.
Live preview
Press ESC to leave fullscreen. Settings are saved in your browser only.
How the Italy Is Always Moving screensaver works
The saver reads the source described above and draws it on a canvas — no account, no tracking.
Every earthquake located by Italy's Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, key-less. The network is dense enough to catch things nobody feels — a quiet hour here is one with fewer than about three earthquakes.
It refreshes on a schedule, so what you see stays current.
Colours and any options can be changed in settings; nothing is stored beyond your own browser.
How Italy's seismic network reports
Italy’s National Institute of Geophysics and Volcanology (INGV) monitors earthquakes across the country and publishes each located event with its origin time, coordinates, depth and magnitude. Italy lies in the zone where the African and Eurasian plates converge, and its seismicity is joined by active volcanoes such as Etna, Vesuvius and the Campi Flegrei.
Because the network is sensitive, the list contains many small events that nobody would notice. Each whole step up in magnitude releases roughly thirty-two times more energy. INGV’s first estimate is usually a local magnitude (ML); for larger events, above about magnitude 3.5, a moment tensor analysis can add a moment magnitude (Mw) when enough data is available. Preliminary magnitudes can differ from the final value by up to about 0.5 units.
Origin times are given in UTC, with Italian local time (UTC+1 in winter, UTC+2 in summer) shown alongside on INGV’s own pages. Early solutions are updated as analysts review the data, and the Italian Seismic Bulletin group later revises events of magnitude 1.5 and above. A cluster in one place is typically an aftershock sequence rather than unrelated earthquakes.
A worked example
Every earthquake located by Italy's Istituto Nazionale di Geofisica e Vulcanologia, key-less. The network is dense enough to catch things nobody feels — a quiet hour here is one with fewer than about three earthquakes.
Settings & tips
- Accent and Background recolour the display.
- Every value on screen comes from the live source — nothing is simulated.
- Press ESC to leave fullscreen.
Frequently asked questions
- Is this real data?
- Yes — it comes from the source named on this page and is refreshed on a schedule.
- Is a key needed?
- No. This source is fully key-less.
- Is it free?
- Yes, and it runs entirely in your browser.
- Why are so many Italian quakes tiny?
- The dense network can detect and locate very small events that would go unrecorded elsewhere, so most listed earthquakes are far below the threshold of feeling.
- Can the magnitude of an earthquake change?
- Yes. INGV’s first estimate is usually a local magnitude, and preliminary values can differ from the final one by up to about 0.5 units as more data arrives and analysts review the event.
- Why does the list show clusters in the same area?
- Large earthquakes are followed by many aftershocks, and volcanic regions can have swarms, producing bursts of events in one place.