New Mexico fire map

How to read the New Mexico map

The map layers government feeds scoped to New Mexico, and each is labeled for exactly what it is — no feed is dressed up as more than it measures.

• Active fires (WFIGS). New Mexico incident points from the National Interagency Fire Center — the interagency system of record — plus mapped perimeters for the subset of fires that publish one. A fire with no published perimeter shows as a point, never a guessed shape.
• Satellite heat detections (FIRMS). NASA flags thermal anomalies within about a minute of a satellite pass; the New Mexico layer is filtered from the national pull. A detection is a hot spot — not a confirmed fire, and not a photograph. A “live satellite fire map” here means heat detections, never imagery.
• Smoke — the grey plumes (HMS). The soft grey areas are NOAA’s Hazard Mapping System smoke analysis: analysts trace smoke plumes once a day from satellite imagery — overhead column smoke, dated, not a ground-level reading. Hover or tap a plume for its analysis date. Smoke drifts across state lines, so this layer isn’t New Mexico-only; see the dedicated smoke map, or check ground-level AQI on the air quality map.
• Air quality (AirNow). Ground-monitor AQI lives on the air quality map, shown with its agency credit.

Reading today’s New Mexico data

As of 2026-08-27 08:41 UTC, WFIGS shows 25 active wildfires in New Mexico covering roughly 18,923 acres (77 km²). The largest is Frijoles, at 15,288 acres (62 km²) and 59 % contained. NASA satellites logged 13 heat detections over New Mexico in the last 24 hours — thermal anomalies, not confirmed fires. By size, 0 are 100,000 acres or larger and 23 are under 1,000. Each figure is stamped with the agency time it was last updated.

New fires — last 48 hours

No new large fires reported in New Mexico in the last 48 hours.

Source: NIFC WFIGS — retrieved Aug 2026 · discovery time (WFIGS FireDiscoveryDateTime) · data as of 2026-08-27 08:41 UTC

New Mexico’s fire season, so far

Right now, 25 wildfires are active across New Mexico, and the largest handful dominate the acreage: the top 8 cover about 98% of the active total (a computed share). These are the fires currently on the feed, not a year-to-date total — a fire can sit at the top of the table even at 100% contained, because it stays on the active feed until it ages out and is never marked “extinguished.”

For running season-to-date acreage and incident counts, see wildfire season 2026, built from the same WFIGS system and updated as the year progresses.

For the national historical picture — how many US wildland fires burn and how many acres they take every year since 1983, from the official NIFC record — see US wildfire statistics. It’s the long-run context New Mexico’s current fires sit inside.

A verified New Mexico-specific all-time ranking (the state’s largest fires in history) needs a state-level historical dataset we’re still verifying — so this page doesn’t publish one rather than show history we can’t yet stand behind. The table above ranks the largest fires active today.

Largest fires of 2026 in New Mexico

• Frijoles 15,288 acres (62 km²)
• Rabbit Ear East 1,700 acres (7 km²)
• Laughlin 786 acres (3 km²)
• Johnson 401 acres (2 km²)
• Mesa Rica 144 acres (1 km²)
• Sunset 133 acres (1 km²)

Top 6 by acreage on the live WFIGS feed · Source: NIFC WFIGS — retrieved Aug 2026 · data as of 2026-08-27 08:41 UTC. All-time historical rankings await a verified historical source.

Who manages wildfire in New Mexico

Responsibility is split between state and federal agencies; this map reads the interagency record they publish. For a specific incident’s official status, evacuation orders, or emergency information, go to the responsible agency — this map is situational awareness, not an emergency service.

• New Mexico Forestry Division (EMNRD) — state lead on wildfire on non-federal, non-municipal lands.
• USDA Forest Service, Southwestern Region — federal lead on national forest lands in New Mexico.
• National Interagency Fire Center (NIFC) — interagency coordination; publisher of the WFIGS system of record this map reads.

What you can do with it

• See where fires are in New Mexico today. The map and the largest-active-fires table answer it at a glance — statewide, or zoomed to your region.
• Check a specific part of New Mexico. Pan to Northern New Mexico (the Sangre de Cristo and the northern mountains) or Southern New Mexico (the Gila and the southern ranges) — the whole state is on one map; there is no separate page to hunt for.
• Find fires near you. Allow location and the map recenters on you; the near-me view is served by your browser, so city-level checks don’t need their own page.
• See if your area is smoky. Cross to the smoke map and the air quality map, or step back to the national wildfire map.

No app to install — it works in any browser, on any device.

Frequently asked questions

What are the grey areas on the New Mexico map?

They are wildfire-smoke plumes from NOAA’s Hazard Mapping System (HMS) — a dated, once-daily satellite analysis of where smoke is in the atmosphere. It is smoke aloft, not necessarily at ground level, so a grey area can sit overhead while the air you breathe is clear. Hover or tap a plume for its analysis date. For smoke alone see the smoke map; for ground-level AQI see the air quality map.

Where are the fires in New Mexico today?

The live map and the largest-active-fires table at the top of this page show every large wildfire currently on the national feed for New Mexico. Zoom to your region to see what is burning right now.

How many wildfires are burning in New Mexico right now?

As of 2026-08-27 08:41 UTC, WFIGS reports 25 active New Mexico wildfires. That is a count of fires currently on the active feed, not a year-to-date total.

Is there a fire near me in New Mexico?

Allow location access and the map recenters on you; the near-me view is served by your browser’s location, so there is no separate page to find. City- and county-level queries are answered by panning and zooming this one map.

Where are the Northern New Mexico fires?

Pan the map to Northern New Mexico — the Sangre de Cristo and the northern mountains. There is no separate Northern New Mexico map; the state map shows every active fire.

What are the largest wildfires in New Mexico?

The table above ranks the largest fires active today, by reported acreage. An all-time historical ranking needs a verified historical dataset, which we have not finished verifying — so we do not publish one here rather than show unsourced history.

Is this a live New Mexico wildfire tracker?

Yes — it reads WFIGS incidents, NASA FIRMS heat detections, and NOAA HMS smoke, each stamped with its own agency time, and runs in any browser with nothing to install.

Where the New Mexico data comes from

Every number on this page traces to a primary government feed — WFIGS (NIFC) for incidents, FIRMS (NASA) for heat detections, and HMS (NOAA) for smoke — with the exact source and “data as of” time shown beside it. Missing data is shown as missing, never zero or inferred; totals such as active-fire acreage are labeled as computed sums, not year-to-date figures. Perimeters are published for only a subset of fires; where none exists, the fire shows as a point.

The full source list, licenses, and a live feed-health strip are on the data sources & methodology page.

Source: NIFC WFIGS — retrieved Aug 2026 · Source: NASA FIRMS — retrieved Aug 2026 · data as of 2026-08-27 08:41 UTC