An ophthalmic apparatus including a supporting device for a patient and an eye treatment device. The apparatus includes a contact element for spatially fixing an eye of the patient with respect to the treatment device, and a positioning device for shifting the supporting device and a contact element relative to each other in order to position the eye, before it is fixed using the contact element, at a predetermined nominal position relative to the contact elements. The ophthalmic apparatus includes a detection device, which records an image of the eye of the patient present on the supporting device and, on the basis of said recorded image, determines an indication concerning a relative shift of the supporting device with respect to the contact element, which shift is required to move the eye to the nominal position by means of the positioning device.
