There is a wide range of freely-available software for simulating and
modeling microlensing events. Click a package name to see more details.
Event modeling and simulation
pyLIMA
- Lead developer
- Etienne Bachelet, Las Cumbres Observatory
- Collaborators
- Valerio Bozza, University of Salerno, Rachel Street, Martin Norbury, Las Cumbres Observatory
- Download
- pyLIMA Github Repo
- Documentation
- pyLIMA documentation
- Publications
- Bachelet, E. et al. (2017) AJ, 154, 203
VBMicrolensing
- Lead developer
- Valerio Bozza, Università Degli Studi Di Salerno
- Download
- VBBinaryLensing Github repo
- Publications
- Bozza, V. (2010) MNRAS, 408, 2188
- Bozza, V. et al. (2018), MNRAS, 479, 5157
- Bozza, V. et al. (2021) MNRAS, 505, 126
- Bozza, V. et al. (2025), A&A, 694, 219
RTModel
- Lead developer
- Valerio Bozza, Università Degli Studi Di Salerno
- Download
- RTModel Github repo
- Website
- Real time modeling results
- Publications
- V.Bozza, (2024), A&A, 688, 83,
- Documentation
- RTModel documentation
MuLAN
- Lead developer
- Clement Ranc, NASA Goddard Space Flight Center
- Collaborators
- Arnaud Cassan, Institut d'Astrophysique de Paris
- Download
- muLAn Github Repo
- Documentation
- muLAn documentation
MuLensModel
- Lead developer
- Radek Poleski, Ohio State University
- Collaborators
- Jennifer Yee, CfA Harvard
- Download
- MuLensModel Github Repo
- Documentation
- MuLensModel documentation
- Publications
- Poleski and Yee et al. (2018)
BAGLE
- Lead developer
- Jessica Lu, UC Berkeley
- Collaborators
- Casey Lam (Carnegie Observatories), Michael Medford, Natasha Abrams (UC Berkeley), Sean Terry (University of Maryland and NASA Goddard Space Flight Center), Jeff Chen (UC Berkeley), and Niranjan Bhatia (UC Berkeley)
- Download
- BAGEL Github Repo
- Documentation
- BAGEL documentation
eesunhong
- Lead developer
- David Bennett, NASA Goddard
- Collaborators
- Sun Hong Rhie, Greg Olmschenk
- Download
- eesunhong Github Repo
- Publications
- Several, see in particular:
Bennett and Rhie (1996)
Bennett (2010)
nbi — Neural Bayesian Inference for microlensing
- Lead developer
- Keming Zhang, UC San Diego
- Download
- nbi Github Repo
- Publications
- Zhang et al. (2023)
MAGIC microlensing
- Lead developer
- Haimeng Zhao and Wei Zhu, Tsinghua University
- Download
- Github Repo
- Publications
- Zhao & Zhu et al. (2022) AJ, 164, 192
MicroJax
- Lead developer
- Shota Miyazaki and Hajime Kawahara
- Download
- Github Repo
- Publications
- Miyazaki, S., & Kawahara, H. 2025, ApJ, 994, 144
MicroLux
- Lead developer
- Haibin Ren
- Download
- Github Repo
- Publications
- Haibin, R. & Zhu, W. (2025), AJ, 169, 3
Twinkle
- Lead developer
- Suwei Wang
- Download
- Github Repo
- Publications
- Wang et al, (2025), ApJS, 276, 40
Galactic models and population synthesis
PopSyCLE
- Lead developer
- Casey Lam, Carnegie Observatories
- Collaborators
- Jessica Lu (UC Berkeley), Michael Medford, Natasha Abrams (UC Berkeley), Sam Rose (Caltech)
- Download
- PopSyCLE Github Repo
- Publications
- Lam et al. (2020)
Rose et al. (2022)
genulens
- Lead developer
- Naoki Koshimoto, Nunota Kansuke
- Download
- Github Repo
- Publications
- Koshimoto, Baba & Bennett (2021), ApJ, 917, 78
SynthPop
- Lead developer
- Macy Hudson et al.
- Download
- Github Repo
- Publications
- Hudson, M. et al. (2026), arXiv: 2603.12219v2
Parameter Inference
Once a microlensing event has been modeled it is possible to combine all
information on the system to infer the properties of the lensing system. The
following packages exist for this purpose.
PyLIMASS
- Lead developer
- Etienne Bachelet
- Download
- Part of PyLIMA's Github Repo
- Publications
- E. Bachelet et al. (2024), AJ, 169, 24
PopClass
- Lead developer
- Peter McGill
- Download
- Github Repo
- Publications
- G. Sallaberry, et al. (2025), Journal of Open Source Software, vol. 10, id. 7769