Agricultural irrigation water is responsible for about 40% of global food production. Yet, water use efficiency is still below 40% and food production could increase by 40% with better water use. In a context of increasing water scarcity, low water use efficiency could impact the sustainability of irrigated agriculture production. Among the potential solutions to improve water use efficiency figures precision irrigation. Although precision irrigation systems are commercially available, little scientific evidence exists on variable rate irrigation and on how to produce prescription maps. Spectral vegetation indices, especially Normalized Difference Vegetation Index, are often used to gauge crop vigor and related parameters (e.g. leaf nitrogen content and grain yield). However, research heretofore rarely addresses the influence of soil moisture on the indices. The objectives of this study were to determine 1) if vegetation indices derived from multispectral satellite imagery could assist in quantifying soil moisture variability in irrigated maize production systems, and 2) the period of time which a single image is representative of soil moisture conditions A variable rate irrigation pivot was used to form six water treatment zones. Each zone was equipped with a set of tensiometers installed in the center of the plots at 20, 45, and 75cm depths to individually monitor conditions in the water treatment zones. Water was applied at variable rates from 40% evapotranspiration (ET) to 140% ET. Findings from this study indicate that Red Edge Normalized Difference Vegetation Index could quantify variability of soil moisture tension at V6 (six leaf) (r² = 0.850, p = 0.009) and V9 (nine leaf) (r² = 0.913, p = 0.003) crop growth stages. Results suggest that satellite-derived vegetation indices may be useful for creating time-sensitive characterizations of soil moisture variability at the field-scales. Future studies are needed to evaluate field-scale yield implications of variable rate irrigation management.