The Astronomy Picture of the Day entry published August 7, 2026, featured an image of the COSMOS field from the NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory in Chile. According to the accompanying explanation, the central panel contains more than half a million galaxies. The field is a patch of sky several times larger than the full moon, first observed by Hubble and later by Webb and other telescopes because it has comparatively few bright stars from our own galaxy, offering a relatively unimpeded view of galaxies beyond the Milky Way. Ten numbered outer panels show zoomed-in views of small regions marked in the central panel, displaying a wide variety of galaxy shapes and sizes; some are so distant that their light has traveled for billions of years.

The explanation stated that Rubin would return to the COSMOS field every couple of days as part of its ten-year Legacy Survey of Space and Time, allowing a dynamic view of how the sky changes over time. The image was credited to the NSF-DOE Vera C. Rubin Observatory, NOIRLab, SLAC and AURA.