Photo: Unsplash
What to do
Northern Lights in Iceland
The northern lights aren’t a show, they’re weather: you can’t order them, you have to wait for them. There are ways to do the waiting in the right place on the right night.
- Season
- September – March
- Best hours
- 21.00 – 01.00
- Nights needed
- At least 3
Guide · how to see the lights
The northern lights form when charged particles from the sun hit gas atoms in the upper atmosphere. The green is oxygen reacting about 100 kilometres up; red comes from higher still, and purple and pink from nitrogen. Iceland is geographically right in the middle of it: the island sits beneath the band where the lights appear most often.
The result is that activity is rarely the problem; clear skies are. Most visitors plan by looking at the Kp value, but what decides a night is first the clouds, second the moon, and only third the activity.
The short answer
- Which months
- Mid-September – end of March
- Can you see them in summer
- No, the night doesn’t get dark
- Visible from the city
- On strong nights yes, but faint
- How many nights to stay
- Three nights, ideally four
Check three things before you spend a night out
-
01
The cloud map
Veðurstofa Íslands’ cloud map shows the whole country, and white areas mean clear sky. If more than half the screen is green (that is, cloudy), there’s no point getting in the car that night, whatever the activity. Cloud is the only real obstacle on this list.
-
02
Moon phase
A full moon wipes out a weak display completely. At the same Kp value, the ten days around the new moon mean a much darker sky. Planning your calendar around it is the adjustment most people never think of, and the one that helps most.
-
03
Activity: Bz, not Kp
The Kp number everyone looks at is actually the least important. The real variable is Bz, the southward component of the magnetic field. When it’s negative (ideally −5 nT or below), Earth’s magnetosphere opens the door. Seeing Kp 5 while Bz is positive is like looking at a locked house with the key in your hand.
The live forecast at the top of this page reads all three for you, for several spots around the island.
Where to go
Getting away from city light is enough; you don’t need to climb a mountain. If you’re staying in Reykjavík, the nearest dark spot is Grótta lighthouse, at the tip of Seltjarnarnes, fifteen minutes from the centre; just remember the causeway floods at high tide. The places below are both dark and have something to put in the foreground of a photo: an empty-sky photo gets boring after the third night.
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Viewpoint Free
Kleifarvatn Lake
The largest lake on Reykjanes, Kleifarvatn is a spellbinding and mysterious crater lake with no visible outflow, known for the black volcanic beaches around it, steep mountains and underwater hot springs.
Grindavík 23 km Reykjavík 25 km
- 30 min
- Paved
- Easy
-
Historic site Free
Þingvellir National Park
A UNESCO World Heritage Site, Þingvellir is where the Alþingi, one of the world’s oldest parliaments, was founded in AD 930. Split by deep gorges and fissures where the Eurasian and North American tectonic plates pull apart, the national park, with its unique geology and lake, is Iceland’s national heart.
Hveragerði 29 km Reykjavík 41 km
- 2 hours
- Paved
- Easy
-
Viewpoint Free
Kirkjufell
The country’s most photographed mountain, framed together with the waterfall beside it.
Grundarfjörður Photo Spot 3 km Reykjavík 110 km
- 1 hour
- Paved
- Easy
-
Glacier Free
Jökulsárlón Glacier Lagoon
Where giant blue and black-striped icebergs calved from Breiðamerkurjökull drift silently out to the Atlantic, Jökulsárlón is Iceland’s most iconic natural wonder. With amphibious boat tours and seals swimming among the ice, it gives visitors a surreal polar landscape.
Höfn 53 km Reykjavík 277 km
- 1.5 hours
- Paved
- Easy
-
Viewpoint Free
Mývatn
A shallow lake with a crater landscape around it; in summer be ready for clouds of midges.
Húsavík 51 km Reykjavík 284 km
- 3 hours
- Paved
- Easy
-
Viewpoint Paid
Vestrahorn
Rising in sheer cliffs 454 metres from the ocean shore on the Stokksnes peninsula, Vestrahorn, with its steep, jagged peaks, is also called “Batman Mountain”. Made of gabbro rich in iron and magnesium, its silhouette above the black sand makes it the country’s most dramatic peak.
Höfn 11 km Reykjavík 337 km
- 1.5 hours
- Gravel
- Easy
Photography: starting settings
A tripod isn’t negotiable: exposures last seconds. Open the lens to its widest aperture (f/2.8 or wider), keep ISO between 1600 and 3200 and try 5–10 seconds. If the curtain is moving fast, a shorter exposure with higher ISO captures the structure instead of a blurry green wash.
Don’t leave focus on auto: zoom in on a bright star in live view, set focus to infinity by hand and tape the focus ring. A phone works too. The night modes of the last few years are surprisingly good, but you must rest the phone against something.
Realistic expectations
To the naked eye the lights are often not as colourful as in photos. A weak curtain looks like pale grey-green smoke; the camera records the same thing as saturated green. That isn’t a trick (the sensor can accumulate light), but setting your expectations accordingly saves the evening.
On a one-night visit the chance of seeing them is low. Someone staying three nights in season, with normal weather, catches at least one clear night. That’s why tours usually offer a free second night if you don’t see them.
Take with you
- A flask, because the waiting happens in the cold
- Thick gloves and a spare battery (the cold drains batteries)
- A red-light torch: it doesn’t ruin your night vision
- A lay-by to park off the road (stopping on the road with hazards on is illegal)
Check for yourself
Where to follow it
This page brings several sources together. Before you set off, look at the originals too, especially the cloud map and road conditions.
- Veðurstofa Íslands The Icelandic Met Office’s official aurora and cloud map. The first place everyone on the island looks. en.vedur.is
- NOAA · 30-minute forecast The source of this page’s OVATION reading: where the lights will be in half an hour. swpc.noaa.gov
- NOAA · Aurora dashboard Kp, solar wind and storm alerts on one screen. swpc.noaa.gov
- SpaceWeatherLive Minute-by-minute charts of Bz and wind speed; you can also set up alerts. spaceweatherlive.com
- Umferðin · road conditions Ice and closures on the roads before you head out at night. umferdin.is
- SafeTravel Current warnings, and a travel plan you can leave with someone. safetravel.is
Data: NOAA Space Weather Prediction Center (Kp, solar wind, OVATION) · Weather data by Open-Meteo.com (cloud cover, CC BY 4.0). The score is a forecasting aid, not a guarantee that the lights will appear.