Thanks to the Hα narrowband filter, VPHAS+ will reveal emission line objects of the following types:

The inclusion of the u band filter enables selection of the following:

Different filter combinations also support effective selection of:

The Hα narrowband images reveal diffuse ionised nebulae of all types: HII regions, supernova remnants, spatially-resolved planetary nebulae. The sensitivity of the r-Hα colour to intrinsic stellar colour can also be exploited along with the broadband data to trace line-of-sight extinction, at high angular resolution.