Bhuvan will offer superior imagery of Indian locations (compared to Google Earth) with spatial resolutions ranging from 6 m to 55m; locations can be viewed from different perspectives and will allow for the measurement of distances. Bhuvan offers locally-pertinent features such as wasteland mapping, administrative limits of States and districts as well as weather information, though its imagery would steer clear of sensitive military installations.

The portal was inaugurated by Prithviraj Chavan, Minister of State at the Prime Minister’s Office, during a workshop on '21st Century challenges in space – Indian context' at the Astronautical Society of India. The inaugaration was timed to coincide with the 90th birth anniversary of Vikram Sarabhai who is regarded as the father of India's pace programme.  

The Bhuvan portal is designed to run on slow Internet connections as well and can be accessed at the following URL: bhuvan.nrsc.gov.in