Celestron StarSense Explorer LT 114AZ App-Enabled Telescope – 114mm Newtonian Reflector with Smartphone Dock & StarSense App – iPhone & Android Compatible – Easy-to-Use for Beginners

Light weight. Works fantastic. Easy to use. Clear viewing. Has a red dot which makes centering on moon, stars easy. Took some time to put together, but easy to follow directions. Love that it comes with multiple lens.

We chose this as our first telescope. A major factor was to view the eclipse on April 8th, from Waco, TX (we have people from across the country joining us). The "Eclipsesafe Lense" was available for $20. I watched a pair of reviews, and the Setup guide from Celestron, and had no issues assembling, setting up, and using all the features of this telescope. Within 20 minutes, I had the app, and red dot aligned, and viewing the moon with my family. It was a great first experience, and we are looking forward to many stary nights, and joining our local Astronomical Society. For $200 delivered to my door, including the eclipse filter, the cost of entry was cheap. We hope to upgrade in a couple years, and give this to a friend, and draw them into the hobby.

Overall The product is good and the application is a nice addition. The movement once the telescope is set up is a little finicky. It is hard to make small changes.

This is my first telescope, and I've taken some really good pictures of the moon, and lunar craters. I have one blurry picture of Saturn 🪐 but I am still a beginner. With the right phone mount and camera settings, I could do better. The telescope was a great price and I highly recommend it to anyone interested in amateur astronomy

I had no experience with astronomy, but thought I would try this because the app seemed like it will really help the novice user. First the unlock code for the Starsense app that came with telescope wasn't valid. It took a few days of back and forth emails with IT to get a valid code. The quality of telescope is okay, however calibrating the red dot in the finder scope was not easy at all, as the screws to adjust it are plastic and cheap and despite my best efforts it just would not align properly. The movement of the dot was not consistent due to the cheap threads on the elevation and lateral adjustments for the red dot. Also, you really need to tighten the thumb screws down super tight where the finder scope mounts to the telescope. On mine they kept coming loose and it would go out of calibration. The last straw really was once I finally got a valid code for star sense app, torqued down the the finder scope, I was ready to view the night sky! Well the app never was able to find the telescope and kept giving me an error. I was really patient with this hole process, but I tried it several times and it just would not work. In the end I returned the whole thing. I'll guess I'll wait to develop a new hobby till I can afford a cope with its own software and motorized for finding objects. The other thing here I learned is this scope isn't very powerful and is best served only looking at planets and the moon. But I don't know for sure because mine never worked.

Ok so got this yesterday around 5 pm put it together and boom was watching the moon, arrived just in time for the Lunar Eclipse Blood Moon, pics attached. No collimation needed, easy setup and Star Sense App worked immediately with no issues. Red dot finder worked amazingly well and am super happy with my purchase. This is a great scope for beginners for the money or if you don’t want to spend on an equatorial telescope. You are ready right out of the box immediately ready to star gaze!!! I was also able to use my iPhone to take these pics!!

Claims of being a good first telescope i disagree with them. Where to begin? I bought the telescope based on some the reviews and the feature using the phone app to help view different celestial bodies. I also wanted something that was more compact. And instead of having to look from the end of the barrel, I could look from the side of the barrel. I found the packaging to be sufficient to protect it and it came in good shape. Putting the telescope together was very easy, and I had no problems. Some of the flaws that I ran into that made me give this a less than stellar rating, start with the adjustments and the tightening of certain screws. The lock screw that helps tighten the telescope and prevent it from revolving, where it connects to the tripod. As soon as you attempt to tighten it a little bit, it automatically forces the telescope to shift just a little bit, but takes it off of the celestial body you happen to be viewing. This was very frustrating because I was trying to keep it from shifting, as I was looking through the eyepiece. The other 2 features causing me great frustration in trying to be able to locate any celestial body. The star sense app does not give an accurate view or assistance in locating the celestial body you're hoping to find. I attempted multiple times to adjust The Star sense locator, but to no avail. The other thing I found was every time I mount and unmount the cell phone into the star sense, locator device, it forces it out of alignment immediately. There's a red dot locator also mounted on the telescope. I've had no luck in trying to adjust the red dot into any manner where it will help me. Pinpoint the celestial body that I'm hoping to view. It has become a waste of time for me to use that at all. In order to locate anything, it has to be of a larger celestial body. Like the moon so far, that's been the only celestial body that I've been able to identify and to locate it, I've had to actually use the eye peace viewing tube without the magnifying eyepiece in place. I will compliment that the construction of the telescope and tripod and all feel of a good quality and sturdy and for the price. It was not bad based on pricing of other telescopes out there of this same design. Once I was able to focus on the moon, I found the image to be clear. At this moment, I'm indecisive if I want to keep it or send it back. I'm leaning towards sending it back because of the frustrations that i've had trying to locate celeste body's using what was supposed to be an easy design feature with the star sense app.

Bought it as a Christmas gift for my ex-girlfriend when we were together. She always wanted one and really appreciated it. Focused don Jupiter and moons really nice. The free subscription to the star finder for the phone was junk.