Using the application, you can view a realistic 3D image of the sky as if you were directly observing the sky with your naked eye, binoculars, or a telescope. Then, using the interactive planetarium program, you can explore the night sky anytime and anywhere on Earth.

As an educational tool, Stellarium can be used to learn about the night sky and to plan telescope observations. It is an ideal tool for understanding the celestial sphere and the seasonal movements of astronomical objects. The default installation has over 600 000 stars and many deep-sky catalogs and images. Furthermore, Stellarium is expandable, with a wide range of free plug-ins and educational resources available for download. Stellarium also provides a basic scripting interface that allows users to create custom simulations. Currently, Stellarium is available as an open-source project. According to the GNU Public License, the program's source code is freely available and may be adapted and redistributed.