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Yes. Scientists have captured real images of two black-hole environments: M87* in 2019 and the Milky Way’s Sagittarius A* in 2022. The images show glowing material surrounding a dark central shadow—not the event horizon itself, and never light escaping from inside it.
Those observations are only part of the picture. Follow-up work has revealed magnetic-field patterns, enormous jets, gamma-ray activity and changes in the brightness of M87*’s ring.
What a black-hole image actually shows
The Event Horizon Telescope (EHT) images are reconstructions based on real observations, not artist’s impressions. The EHT linked radio observatories around the world to act as a virtual, Earth-sized telescope. Its 2017 observations used a wavelength of 1.3 mm to produce the first image of M87*, announced on April 10, 2019. The EHT’s announcement describes the bright ring and dark center.
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The ring is emission from hot material around the black hole. The central darkness is the black-hole shadow: light is bent by the object’s gravity, and some light is captured rather than reaching us. The shadow is larger than the event horizon, the boundary beyond which light cannot escape. So “picture of a black hole” is a useful shorthand, but the image does not show a surface or reveal anything from inside the horizon.
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The two landmark black-hole images
| Object | Image release | Distance and mass | What made the imaging distinctive |
|---|---|---|---|
| M87*, at the center of galaxy Messier 87 | 2019; based on 2017 observations | About 55 million light-years away; 6.5 billion solar masses, as reported by the EHT in 2019. | Its surroundings changed more slowly during the observations than those of Sagittarius A*, making it comparatively steadier to image. |
| Sagittarius A* (Sgr A*), at the center of the Milky Way | 2022; based on 2017 observations | About 27,000 light-years away; about four million solar masses, as reported by the EHT in 2022. | Gas close to it changes rapidly, completing an orbit in minutes. The published image combines many reconstructions to show their shared features. |
Sources: the EHT’s 2019 M87* announcement and 2022 Sgr A* announcement.
Sgr A* is much closer to Earth, but proximity did not make it easier to photograph. Its rapidly shifting surroundings meant that the EHT had to account for a changing target; the resulting image is an average reconstruction, not a snapshot of a single unchanging ring.
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What the images reveal about magnetic fields and jets
In 2021, the EHT published polarized-light observations of M87*. Polarization patterns in the ring provide information about magnetic fields near the black hole. The collaboration reported that models with strongly magnetized gas explain the observations and help researchers understand how matter flows inward and how jets can be launched. Its polarization account describes bright jets extending at least 5,000 light-years from M87’s center.
A jet is an outflow from the black-hole system, not material emerging from inside the event horizon. In the EHT’s explanation, particles in the surrounding region can be driven outward before they are captured. The polarized image offers evidence about the conditions that help shape this activity; it is not, by itself, a direct measurement of the jet’s total power.
Observations beyond the famous ring
A multi-wavelength view of M87
The ring image is a close-up of a compact region, not a picture of the whole system. A 2021 composite combined observations from 19 observatories and facilities on Earth and in space to show M87 and its jet across a range of scales. The EHT’s account of the campaign makes clear how the immediate black-hole environment connects to a much larger active galaxy.
A gamma-ray flare observed in 2018
A separate multi-wavelength campaign used more than two dozen ground- and space-based facilities to study M87 during observations in April 2018. The EHT reported the results in 2024: a gamma-ray flare lasted about three days, and the emission region was constrained to less than three light-days across—about 170 AU. These dates matter: the flare was observed in 2018, not 2024. The 2024 report links the flare to activity in M87’s powerful jet, but does not establish a single headline figure for the system’s total power.
M87* changes over time
The first M87* image was not the final word. An EHT analysis published in 2025 compared observations from 2017 and 2018. It reported a ring about 43 microarcseconds in diameter and a roughly 30-degree shift in the brightest region. The team interpreted the change as consistent with turbulence in the accretion flow—the hot material moving around the black hole—and expanded its simulation library by more than 120,000 images. Those simulations help interpret the observations; they are not themselves telescope photographs. See the EHT’s 2025 analysis.
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Why these are spectacular—and what they do not prove
The images are remarkable because they resolve the immediate surroundings of objects whose apparent sizes are tiny in the sky. The EHT likened Sgr A*’s apparent size to a donut on the Moon. But the strongest conclusions come from combining types of evidence: the ring and shadow show the close-in environment; polarized light probes magnetic fields; and observations across wavelengths reveal jets and energetic events on much larger scales.
Quick Recap
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- The EHT has made real observational images of M87* and Sgr A*; neither is an artist’s rendering.
- The dark center is a shadow, not a visible outline of the event horizon.
- The magnetic-field patterns and jet observations support an account of energetic activity around M87*, but the cited results do not supply one comparable measurement of the black-hole system’s total power.
- Changes in M87*’s ring brightness show that its surroundings are dynamic, not a fixed glowing halo.
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