RegiStax review: free planetary stacking from 2011
Where does it rank on our leaderboard
| Rank | Software | Stars for Your Buck | Recorded UK price |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Stellarium | 100 out of 100 | Free |
| 2 | NINA | 98 out of 100 | Free |
| 3 | SharpCap | 97 out of 100 | £14 |
| 6 | PHD2 | 94 out of 100 | Free |
| 9 | ASIAIR app | 89 out of 100 | Free |
| 11 | StarXTerminator | 85 out of 100 | £45 |
| 13 | RegiStax | 77 out of 100 | Free |
| 15 | DeepSkyStacker | 71 out of 100 | Free |
| 16 | Adobe Photoshop | 67 out of 100 | £22 |
Contents
- 01 Where does it rank on our leaderboard
- 02 Specifications and features
- 03 A walk through RegiStax
- 04 Should you buy it?
- 05 Questions and more about this review
In 30 seconds
Stars for Your Buck 77/100
Written 2 Oct 2026 Updated 2 Oct 2026
- Rank
- #13 of 16 software
- Verdict
- Damon recommends
Written by Damon Scotting 3 min read
Buy it if
- You are starting out on the Moon and the planets and want a free program to stack and sharpen your first videos.
Skip it if
- You want the finest planetary detail: these days I get better results from AutoStakkert! instead.
- You need a program that copes with heavy jobs on a modest laptop: RegiStax crashed on me plenty.
“I have a lot of happy memories of RegiStax. It was what I used when I first started imaging Jupiter, the Moon, Saturn and Mars. It can feel confusing at first, but it does a good job of simplifying things. It frustrated me plenty by crashing, which I now put partly down to how much I was asking of my laptop, and that is one reason I moved on to AutoStakkert!. It gets 77: generous because it is free, not higher because I prefer other tools, and next to them it is now fairly limited.”
Specifications and features
Against other software for the Moon and the planets
Compare with
| RegiStax reviewed #13 of 16 | ASIStudio #12 of 16 | SharpCap #3 of 16 | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Recorded UK price | Free | Free | £14 |
| Stars for Your Buck | 77/100 | 82/100 | 97/100 |
| Made by | Cor Berrevoets (the Netherlands) and the RegiStax 6 development team | ZWO (Suzhou, China) | Robin Glover (UK) |
| What it is for | Aligning, stacking and processing images | Planetary and deep-sky capture, live stacking and stacking | Camera capture, live stacking and polar alignment |
| Current version | 6.1.0.8 (6 May 2011), an update to RegiStax 6.1 | 1.22 | 4.1.14310 (10 Jul 2026) |
| Operating systems | Windows (.exe installers); no Windows version named | Windows (64 and 32 bit), macOS, Linux | Windows 11, 10, 8.1 and 7 SP1 |
A walk through RegiStax
Alignment setup Setting up the alignment points on a lunar crater: the minimum distance between points, the distance from the edge and the size of each alignment box. Image: RegiStax website.
Alignment points With the minimum distance raised to 30, RegiStax places 131 alignment points across the crater and its surroundings. Image: RegiStax website.
Alignment data Each yellow patch traces how that point moved from frame to frame; a larger red circle marks movement that strays more. Image: RegiStax website.
Choosing the best frames The Limit step keeps only the best frames for the stack: here 50 of the 100 in the video. Image: RegiStax website.
Stacking The stacking options, with Correct geometry ticked and the option to save the aligned frames as a new video. Image: RegiStax website.
Wavelet sharpening Wavelets bring out the detail in the stack: six layers, each with its own denoise and sharpen setting. Image: RegiStax website.
Should you buy it?
77/100 Stars for Your Buck
Pros
- It is free.
- Once you are past the confusing start, it does a good job of simplifying things.
Cons
- It can feel confusing at first.
- It crashed on me plenty, which I now put partly down to how much I was asking of my laptop.
- Next to the tools available today it is fairly limited.
It gets 77: generous because it is free, not higher because I prefer other tools, and next to them it is now fairly limited.
Who the RegiStax is for
Beginner imaging the Moon and the planets
Buy
It is free, and once it clicks it does a good job of simplifying things.
Planetary imager chasing the finest detail
Skip
I moved on to AutoStakkert! and get better, more finely tuned results from it.
Three alternatives I have reviewed
AutoStakkert! Free, and where I moved on to: better, more finely tuned planetary results 93/100 Price not recorded Review coming
ASIStudio Free from ZWO, with ASIVideoStack for planetary videos 82/100 Free Read the review · SharpCap Captures the planetary videos you stack; free, or Pro at £14 a year 97/100 £14 Read the review
Questions and more about this review
Reviewed by
Damon Scotting
The Telescope Man Verified
BSc (Hons) Physics with Astrophysics and Cosmology, Loughborough University PGCE / QTS, University of Nottingham
About Damon About Damon Damon Scotting is The Telescope Man. He holds a BSc (Hons) in Physics with Astrophysics and Cosmology from Loughborough University and a PGCE with QTS from the University of Nottingham, and taught physics in secondary schools before becoming an astronomy creator. He is a contributing writer for BBC Sky at Night Magazine and the author of 42 Wonders of Our Night Sky, and his photograph of the galaxy M100 with the dwarf planet Ceres was Highly Commended in the Astronomy Photographer of the Year 2024 competition run by Royal Observatory Greenwich. He has appeared on the BBC's Blue Peter. More than 750,000 people follow his astronomy channels on YouTube, Instagram and TikTok, and he has reviewed more than 140 telescopes, mounts, cameras, filters and accessories hands-on for this site. More about Damon · How I test · Damon's book
I review all kinds of gear: most of it I buy, some is gifted and some is loaned, and all of it is reviewed the same way. How this site is funded
Six questions, answered
Questions about the RegiStax
Written 2 October 2026 ·Updated 2 October 2026
I review all kinds of gear. Most of it I buy, some is gifted and some is loaned, and all of it is reviewed the same way: no company sees or approves a review before it is published. How this site is funded
- Is RegiStax free? Yes. The RegiStax website calls it free image processing software, and you download it from the site. The specifications and the comparison table ↓
- What is the latest version? RegiStax 6.1.0.8, released on 6 May 2011. It is an update to RegiStax 6.1, which you install first. The specifications and the comparison table ↓
- Does RegiStax run on Windows 11? The downloads are Windows installers, but the site names no Windows version and the last update came out in 2011, so I cannot confirm that it runs on Windows 11. The specifications and the comparison table ↓
- What does RegiStax do? It aligns and stacks the frames of a video, then sharpens the stack with wavelets: the Align, Stack and Wavelet steps in the walk-through. A walk through RegiStax ↓
- What do I use instead? AutoStakkert!, which is also free. I started with RegiStax, but AutoStakkert! gives me better, more finely tuned results. The specifications and the comparison table ↓
- What have I not tested on the RegiStax? The walk-through screenshots come from the RegiStax website, not a session of mine; my verdict comes from using RegiStax when I first imaged the Moon and the planets.