Lobe · one in each half of the brain

Occipital lobe

The brain's vision center, at the very back of your head.

The occipital lobes sit at the back of your brain and are devoted almost entirely to vision. Signals from your eyes travel through the thalamus and arrive here. They are broken down into edges, colors and motion, then rebuilt into the world you see. From here, vision flows along two main routes: a "what is it?" pathway into the temporal lobe and a "where is it?" pathway into the parietal lobe.

Where it is

At the very back of the head, above the cerebellum and behind the parietal and temporal lobes, under the occipital bone at the back of your skull.

What it does

Seeing

It is the brain's main processor for everything you see.

Edges and shapes

It picks out lines, edges and outlines, the building blocks of every object.

Color

Its lower surface helps turn light signals into the colors you experience.

Motion

Areas on its outer side detect movement and its direction and speed.

Sending vision forward

It passes visual information on to the temporal lobe (what) and the parietal lobe (where).

Think of it as a film studio's editing room, where raw footage from your eyes is cut, color-corrected and assembled into the movie you experience.

Inside the occipital lobe

Primary visual cortexV1: the first cortical stop for sight, a precise map of what your eyes see.
CuneusA wedge of visual cortex that sees the lower half of your view.
Lingual gyrusBelow the calcarine groove: sees the upper half of your view and helps with color.
Lateral occipital cortexWhere lines become objects, and where the brain sees motion.

Works with

Lateral geniculate nucleusThis relay station in the thalamus receives signals from the eyes and passes them here.
Optic radiationThis wide fan of fibers carries visual signals from the thalamus to the back of the brain.
Temporal lobeThe "what" pathway runs forward into the temporal lobe to recognize faces and objects.
Parietal lobeThe "where" pathway runs up into the parietal lobe to guide reaching and attention.
PulvinarThis part of the thalamus responds to visual signals and helps the brain focus on what matters.

When it goes wrong

Losing half of vision

Damage on one side, often from a stroke, can wipe out the same half of vision in both eyes. This is called hemianopia.

Cortical blindness

Damage on both sides can cause blindness even though the eyes are healthy. Rarely, people even insist they can see, a condition called Anton syndrome.

Migraine aura

The shimmering zigzag lines some people see before a migraine come from a slow wave of activity spreading across the visual cortex.

For learning only, not medical advice. If you have a health concern, talk to a doctor.

Surprising facts

Your eyes are at the front of your head, but the main vision center is at the very back.
In people blind from an early age, the occipital lobe gets put to other uses, such as reading Braille with the fingertips.

Where the name comes from

From the Latin "occiput", the back of the head, built from "ob" (against) and "caput" (head).

Learn it in a lesson

The big pictureCerebrum, cerebellum and brainstem. A short guided lesson in 3D.

Quick quiz

2 questions. Your answers are saved and come back in your daily review.

Which of these is a job of the occipital lobe?
Show the answer
Seeing. It is the brain's main processor for everything you see.
Which part fits this description? "Like a film studio's editing room, where raw footage from your eyes is cut, color-corrected and assembled into the movie you experience."
Show the answer
Occipital lobe. It is the occipital lobe. The brain's vision center, at the very back of your head.

Sources

Neuroanatomy, Occipital Lobe, StatPearls, NCBI Bookshelf
Central Processing, OpenStax, Anatomy and Physiology 2e
Migraine With Aura, StatPearls, NCBI Bookshelf

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Explore the occipital lobe in 3D

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