The Perseid meteor shower is considered the best of the year due to the 50 to 100 meteors viewers can see per hour.

Meteor showers occur when Earth passes through trails of dust and debris left behind by comets or asteroids. The Perseids come from a comet called Swift–Tuttle, which orbits the Sun once every 133 years. The comet's dust particles enter Earth's atmosphere at speeds of about 37 miles (59 kilometres) per second.