In short
The northern lights are a September story in the Arctic, and a short one. From late August the nights come back, and the voyages that sail then, in East Greenland, Disko Bay, the Northwest Passage, Iceland and Labrador, are the ones that see them. June and July never will, because the sun never sets.
The short answer
Four things have to line up: darkness, a clear sky, a high latitude and the sun doing its part. Expedition ships give you the latitude for free. The season gives you the dark from the last week of August. The weather and the sun are the two you cannot book, which is why we talk about odds rather than promises.
If the aurora is the point of the voyage, the honest advice is this: sail in September, choose Greenland or the Northwest Passage, stay as many nights as you can, and ask to be woken. Our month-by-month guide sets out which voyages fall in the dark weeks.
What you are looking at
The aurora is the upper atmosphere glowing. Charged particles from the sun are funnelled by the earth’s magnetic field towards the poles, where they collide with oxygen and nitrogen between roughly 100 and 300 kilometres up. Oxygen gives the familiar green at the lower altitudes and a rarer deep red higher up. Nitrogen gives the purples and blues along the lower fringe of a strong display.
It happens in a ring around the geomagnetic pole, the auroral oval, which sits over northern Scandinavia, Iceland, southern Greenland, Hudson Bay and Alaska on an ordinary night and swells outward when the sun is active. Svalbard, at 78° North, is usually north of the ring, which is why Longyearbyen often sees the lights low in the southern sky rather than overhead.
The strength of a night is given as a Kp number from 0 to 9. At Kp 2 the oval is faint and northerly. At Kp 4 or 5 it is bright and moving over Greenland and the Canadian Arctic. Above that it is a storm, and the lights reach as far south as Scotland and, on the rarest nights, Tasmania.
When the dark comes back
North of the Arctic Circle the sun does not set in high summer, and no amount of solar activity will show you the aurora through daylight. The night returns from the south and from the end of August. By mid-September the Arctic has four to six hours of real darkness a night, and by the end of the month, eight or more.
Late August
Twilight rather than night at the top of Greenland and in the Northwest Passage, but the first displays of the season are seen from ships here in the last week of the month, usually low on the horizon in the small hours.
September
The month. The voyages in Scoresby Sund and along the east coast of Greenland, the Disko Bay sailings from Kangerlussuaq, the final Northwest Passage transits and the Iceland circumnavigations all have dark enough nights, and the weather is usually still kind. The equinox, around the twentieth, is statistically one of the most active periods of the year for geomagnetic storms.
October
The expedition season in the Arctic is over by early October, with the exception of the Labrador and Newfoundland coast, where the autumn voyages continue, the nights are long and the aurora is a regular companion when the sky is clear.
Where the ships are, and what that means
East Greenland and Scoresby Sund
Our first choice. The fjords are sheltered, the skies on the east coast are often clearer than the west, the ships anchor overnight among icebergs, and the latitude of 70° North sits squarely under the auroral oval. A September night at anchor in Scoresby Sund with the lights over the ice is the image most of our guests go home with.
West Greenland and Disko Bay
Ilulissat and Disko Bay are on the same latitude as Scoresby Sund and the September sailings here are shorter and easier to reach. The icefjord in moonlight with the aurora above it is the reason to stay up.
The Northwest Passage
The late-August and September transits have the dark, and the empty sky over Lancaster Sound has no light for a thousand kilometres. The trade-off is cloud: the Canadian Arctic in September is often overcast, and a clear night here is a gift rather than an expectation.
Iceland and Jan Mayen
Iceland sits under the oval and its September nights are long enough. The weather is the variable. The circumnavigations spend their evenings at sea, which gives you the whole sky, and a ship at anchor in the Westfjords is as good a place as any on land.
Svalbard
Not in the expedition season. The midnight sun lasts until late August in Longyearbyen and the dark arrives in earnest only in October, after the last ships have left. Svalbard is the place for the aurora in winter, from land, not from an expedition ship in summer. Guests who want both bears and the aurora combine a June Svalbard voyage with a September one in Greenland.
Labrador and Newfoundland
The autumn voyages from late September into October are the darkest of the season, at a latitude where the oval sits on a good night. The sky over the Torngat Mountains has no town for three hundred kilometres.
The honest odds
On a September voyage of ten nights in Greenland, in an ordinary year, expect clear skies on perhaps four or five of them and some aurora on two or three. In an active year, more. Some voyages see the lights on six nights of nine. Some sail through a week of cloud and see nothing. Both are true, and we say so before you book.
The sun is on your side at the moment. Solar Cycle 25 reached its maximum in 2024 and 2025, and the years just after a maximum have historically produced the strongest geomagnetic storms. The 2026 and 2027 seasons are, on that evidence, among the best in a decade to be in the Arctic in September.
Seeing it from a ship
A ship is a very good place to see the aurora. The horizon is uninterrupted, there is no town glow, and the expedition team is awake. Three things make the difference.
- Ask to be woken. Every expedition ship we recommend will call the cabins when the lights appear if you have asked for it. Tell the expedition leader on the first day, not the first night.
- Go to the darkest deck. The bow or the top deck, away from the bridge wing and the lit windows of the lounge. Give your eyes ten minutes.
- Dress for a long wait. The display builds and fades over an hour or more. The parka, a hat and the same gloves you wore in the Zodiac, and the deck is a fine place to be at two in the morning.
The top deck of SH Vega after dark, with the aurora framed by the ship's mast off the coast of West Greenland. Photographed on a Swan Hellenic SH Vega voyage. © Swan Hellenic
Photographing it from the deck
A moving ship and a long exposure are not natural partners, but a ship at anchor is, and most aurora nights in Greenland are spent at anchor. A wide lens, a high ISO, a short exposure of two to four seconds and a rail to brace against will give you more than you expect. Recent phones with a night mode manage a creditable picture braced on a rail. Our Arctic photography guide covers settings, lenses and the cold.
Planning around it
If the aurora matters to you, tell us so. It changes the month, the coast and the cabin we recommend. A balcony on the side the ship anchors to, a September rather than an August departure, a longer voyage rather than a shorter one. The East Greenland, West Greenland, Northwest Passage, Iceland and Labrador pages show which sailings fall in the dark weeks.
Questions we are asked about the northern lights
Can we see the northern lights in June or July?
No. The sun does not set north of the Arctic Circle in high summer and the aurora cannot be seen through daylight, however strong the display. Late August is the earliest, September the real season.
Is Svalbard good for the aurora?
In winter, from land, yes. During the expedition season, no, because the dark has not returned before the last ships leave. For the aurora from a ship, choose Greenland, the Northwest Passage, Iceland or Labrador.
Which voyage would you choose for it?
A September voyage in Scoresby Sund or along the east coast of Greenland, ten nights or more. It has the latitude, the sheltered anchorages and usually the clearest skies of the Arctic in autumn.
Does the ship wake us if the lights appear?
On the ships we recommend, yes, when you ask. The expedition team keeps a watch overnight and calls the cabins that have requested it. Say so on the first day.
Can we see the aurora in Antarctica instead?
Very rarely from an expedition ship. The Antarctic season is the southern summer, with long daylight, and the aurora australis is mostly a winter phenomenon seen from the research stations. The Arctic in September is the better bet by a wide margin.
