CelestronAstroMaster 80AZS Refractor Telescope - Refractor Telescope for Beginners - Fully-Coated Glass Optics - Adjustable-Height Tripod - BONUS Astronomy Software Package

The telescope itself, for the price is very nice. Nice quality of view. Easy to use. Easy to cary. Sturdy while not heavy. The finder scope/ red dot is garbage. Which is to be expected. Separately, the finder scope, sells for around $20. A decent riffle red dot starts for at least $100. Every time I turn it back on the dot appears on different spot. I mean way different spot. The good thing is the mount of the finder scope is very good and stable and aligned enough with my telescope so I can just look through the round view finder of the finder scope, with the red dot off, and get pretty close to what I’m seeking. I also tried the bigger finder scope/ red dot that Celestron sells for around $50, still garbage. My plan is to add a dovetail to picatinny adapter and add a cheap riffle red dot that I don’t use. Because, even a cheap riffle red dot that’s goes for $40-$50 is going to be alot better than this. Or I’ll just keep using the one that came with the telescope, with the red dot off. It’s not that hard to find the moon and planets. It might be harder for other celestial objects that are dimmer

The stand can be unstable when wanting to look at the stars and moon but it’s really clear also you would have to buy a monitor separately from the telescope to attach to the telescope in order to take pictures from your phone.

Here's my review after 2 months of ownership and using it maybe 10 to 15 nights.The telescope itself works well. I've had great views of the moon, Jupiter, and Saturn with the included eyepieces and the 10-30 zoom eyepiece I purchased. A moon filter was a must and whatever cheap one I bought on ebay is working out fine. The zoom eyepiece is where the mount really shows its inadequacy. The little bit of extra weight from the zoom eyepiece causes the back of the scope to sag a great deal after you get it aimed at an object. It requires a bit of Kentucky windage to get it to settle where you want. Yes, I have the telescope mounted as far forward as possible. It does the same thing with the other eyepieces, just to a lesser degree.The eyepieces that came with it aren't bad. I use the 20mm quite a bit. A zoom is just convenient.My finderscope died within the first couple of days and celestron customer service was very good about sending me a replacement.Overall it's about what I expected for the price. A decent telescope with not the greatest accessories.

i purchased this telescope a couple of weeks ago and i got to say that i have been having a blast. The setup was no longer than 10 min, and it took me less than 2 min to center my first target, iv been using the tripod on marble floors so idk how well it would work on not-so-stable surfaces but for me, its good. The telescope came with 2 eyepieces the 10mm and 20mm, at first i thought i wouldn't be enough to see any sky objects, fortunately, i was wrong, the first night i was able to spot saturn with the 10mm eyepiece, even though it looked really small i was able to distinguish the rings, i even took pictures (which look bad in comparison of what i see with my eyes) the next day i was able to see jupiter (as small as saturn) and i could see the stripes and 3 tiny dots next to it which were the moons i was also able to see mars which looked like a slightly bigger orange/red star. this was ALL with the 10mm eyepiece without a Barlow lens. even though i purchased this telescope i think there are better telescopes for the price range so i encourage viewers to keep looking for better options. The telescope and the tripod are pretty lightweight i carry it around my house back and forth and its not trouble. About the packaging and shipment, i live outside the US and the telescope box arrived in great condition. I think its a great purchase and something you will definitely enjoy using.

My first telescope. Affordable price point, easy set up, easy calibration. Got great looks at the moon.

Update:I dropped a second star after trying to use the scope to look at the moon. This year Jupiter and Saturn were both visible, so I started first on them. Nine months later, Saturn is now a daytime planet and Jupiter sets in the early evening, so I set my sights on the moon. Since I also bought a set of upgraded gold-line eyepieces, I expected to see a nice sharp image. I was very disappointed. Nothing was truly sharp. I tired every trick I knew. I went up and down the magnifications of my gold-line eyepieces. I tried both of the original Celestron eyepieces. I tried a moon filter. I tried adding my 80A filter to the moon filter. I put a cut-out over the large objective lens to reduce total light and increase contrast. I cleaned my eyepieces. I took apart the telescope and cleaned the star diagonal and the objective lens/lenses (The objective uses double lenses). Nothing helped. I began to suspect my eyesight and pulled out my binoculars and found my binoculars and gave me me a nice sharp image at one-eighth the cost. I'm still leaving this telescope 3 stars because I was impressed by it's ability to capture light and see distant faint objects, including Jupiter's moons and Saturn's rings. However, the resolution and contrast were disappointing for a $300+ telescope.Original reviewI dropped a star due to the annoying telescope mount on the tripod. Even with the mechanisms unlocked, when I first got the telescope, the mount was very hard to rotate, both horizontally and vertically. Basically, it is so stiff that once you put enough pressure to overcome the friction, it suddenly shoots past your target. I will provide directions on how reduce this problem, but plan on buying an 8 mm hex key (or 5/16 inch hex key) and Super Lube synthetic grease.I had a beginner telescope since I was 8 or 10 years old and shared it with my kids from time to time until it fell apart somewhere in my late 30s. I'm now past 60 and wanted to be able occasionally look at the moon and planets again, without breaking the bank. I first bought a $150 80mm Hexeum telescope, but returned it a few days later, realizing that I would have to spend lots more to replace every eyepiece and and drill some holes to install a better finder scope. So, it took a big breath, and bought the Celestron 102AZ for $300.When it arrived, I pulled the large refractor scope out of the box and was impressed. The telescope is best described as advanced beginner or pre-intermediate. I put it together and adjusted the finder scope while it was still daylight. After nightfall saw Jupiter and at least 4 moons and Saturn with its rings and at least one moon. The red-spot finder was a big help in targeting the planets and the eyepieces were pretty good for inexpensive Keller lenses. I also bought a 2X and a 3X Svbony Barlow lens to make the images bigger. I was impressed by the quality of the images, even with the beginner eyepieces.Now for the tripod. I know some reviewers expect a heavier tripod, but i found it sturdy enough, especially after trying the lightweight tripod that came with the $150 Hexeum telescope that I returned. However, the telescope mount was very, very stiff for both horizontal rotation (azimuth) and vertical up and down (altitude). I tried oiling various parts with WD-40 and light oil, but that solution failed.After email correspondence with Celestron and reading about similar complaints online, here is what I found. Between the tripod legs, under the mount, there is an overtightened bolt that attaches the horizontal rotating plate to the base that attaches to the legs. Turn the mount upside-down, then use an 8mm (or 5/16 inch) hex key (same thing as an Allen wrench) to loosen the bottom bolt counter-clockwise about a quarter turn. If that's not enough, turn it a hair more. Now flip it back over and try rotating the mount horizontally. If unlocked, it should turn smoothly and freely with almost no friction.The altitude (up and down) mechanism is a little harder to fix. The altitude mechanism attaches the telescope to a horizontally split tube that rotates around two parallel black disks, one on each side of the altitude mechanism, The disks are hidden by an orange cap on one side and grey metal on the other side, but they are visible though the horizontal split (or gap) in the mechanism. You may need a bright light or flashlight to look in the gap and see the black disks. The twisting handle, called the pan handle, reduces the size of the horizontal split (gap), causing the tube to grip onto the disks. Unfortunately, even when completely loosened, there still too much friction on the disks. To reduce the friction, buy some Super Lube Multipurpose Synthetic Grease, then take a toothpick or skewer and dab some grease on the edge of the black disks, which can only be reached through the horizontal "split" or gap in the altitude tube. After you dab in some grease, loosen the pan handle lever and rotate the altitude down and up, over and back in order to spread the grease. I had to dab the grease on the edges of the gap a several times and at multiple altitudes. Although the altitude rotation is not as smooth as I would like, it is a lot better with the synthetic grease.One more detail. Unlike the Hexeum telescope, the Celestron AstroMaster 102AZ does not come with a free carry bag. A decent carry bag is not cheap but is a worthwhile purchase to protect your telescope, especially if you ever need to store the telescope, move to a new apartment, or travel with the telescope.

The media could not be loaded.  The Celestron Astromaster 70AZ is a lovely starter scope for anyone. After re-searching for ages and not really having an idea what is good for a beginner & what’s not I went with this.Easy to set up. Everything is very well made and it comes with two lens pieces that are 20mm & 10mm which for a beginner is more than enough.You can see the moon superbly & the craters. Aswell as other cool clusters & nebulas such as the Pleides & the Orion Nebula.Had great fun with it so far and very happy with the price.I’ve attached a photo & video of the moon. Photo with the 20mm & video with the 10mm. Both using a moon filter.

I have always been interested in space and astronomy but it had never occurred to me to purchase a telescope until recently. I always thought they were for professionals until now but after some time spent researching, I decided to buy one. Though I'm just an amateur and still learning about astronomy, I found the Celestron telescope really easy to set up and use. The instructions are easy to follow and it only took me around 15 minutes to assemble. In the box you get two lenses, a scope cover, tripod and accessory tray. There is also a red dot sight mounted next to the eyepiece which you can use when aiming the telescope. A battery is included for this. The legs have some dove tail screws on them which can be used to adjust the height as needed. I have used the telescope several times since purchase and I am amazed by the quality of what you can see on a clear night. With the help of the internet and some astronomy books, I have been already been able to a far away star, the planet Mars and of course the moon. I quickly realised though, that to gain maximum benefit from this telescope you will need as a minimum a moon filter (the moon is too bright without one) and a barlow lens (which increases magnification). Once I had purchased these additional accessories, I got a lot more out of the telescope. A minor point of criticism for the Celestron is that the handle used to move the telescope left/right/up/down is a little short making precise movements difficult. And when you do see your target in the scope, making small adjustments can be annoying as the scope tends to "bounce back" slightly. Larger movements aren't an issue. That said, for my purposes I am really happy with this product. For the price, I didn't expect a high-end professional telescope but what I got is very good indeed and has provided me with hours of fascination. If you're a beginner interested in the night sky, I would definitely recommend this telescope.

The Celestron Astromaster 70AZ.Nice telescope 70mm lens, 2 x eyepieces a 10mm and a 20mm a star finder light and the 90° fitting to use for the eyepieces. The tripod isn't bad either... it has a tray for your eyepieces and bits.We bought ours to view the rings of Saturn and you can see them quite clearly but the image was small, as you might expect from a budget priced telescope. We could also see Jupiter although a bit blurry although it's many moons were quite clear next to it.Overall the 70AZ is not a bad telescope for a beginner like us but we had some misgivings with the telescope itself.On our telescope, (they may not all be like this) but the rotating wheels axel unit attached to the base to adjust the focus was skewiff while mounted on the tripod which made it look odd, there was no way of straightening this, it was like as if the person who assembled it didn't make sure it was straight before they glued and rivited the end mechanism onto the tube. There was also some very sticky lubrication grease which we got on our hands from the inner chrome focusing tube (we think) and had to use methylated spirit to get it off our hands in the early hours of the morning after viewing Jupiter and Saturn for the first time. The metal ring on the end of the telescope was loose and wouldn't stay put while removing the dust cover, there wasn't even any way of securing it, so there were a few issues we had with it sorry.If you don't have the floor space to keep this sort of telescope on it's tripod, this may not be the type tou want taking up room.Unfortunately we sent the whole thing back, we may get an equivalent at a later date because we did enjoy using this briefly but as soon as we decided to return it we packed it all back up in it's box ready to go back.Remember that no two 70AZ identical telescopes will be the same but this was our experience, don't let us put you off.We hope our information helps, thankyou for reading.

Maybe I just hit a bad one, but the tripod it’s utterly inaccurate. It will not tighten in position. You hold it in position and tighten it and it drops an inch. The only way I can use the higher magnification eye piece is to actually hold it in position with my hand. It can’t even even hold the scope in position while it holds the moon let alone a star.The only way is to try to guess it! You hold the scope an inch above the target and tighten it as much as possible, and then just hold it drops down an holds roughly on where you need it to be... you literally might as well throw the stand away and just hold the scope in your hand, very disappointing.

I got this telescope for my birthday as I have always been interested in astronomy, however, we had a cheap supermarket telescope when I was younger, which put my parents and me off from telescopes at the time. This AstroMaster Refractor is a great starter telescope in my opinion mainly because of it's ease of use. However, I would say that it is most suited for looking at the moon. I saw Jupiter and it's four moons, which was a great experience, however, it is quite difficult to keep track of Jupiter given it's movement across the nightsky and the telescope's handle. I also had difficulties using the finder scope, but that is mainly due to me being as good as blind ;). I would recommend using free mobile apps like SkyView Lite. These are great tools to find your way around the nightsky. Overall, this telescope is great. It is durable and of good quality, but most importantly it is a lot of fun using it to look at the stars. Highly recommended!