Golden Hour Outlook
Golden hour is the stretch of low, warm, directional light shortly after sunrise and before sunset that photographers chase for portraits, landscapes, and cityscapes. This tab is a forecast-based estimate of how good upcoming golden hours are likely to look, based on cloud cover, chance of rain, and visibility at your selected location -- not just when golden hour happens, but whether it's actually worth showing up for.
Upcoming Golden Hours
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- ★★★★★ Ideal
- Clear line of sight to the horizon with some mid/high cloud to catch color, very low chance of rain, and good visibility.
- ★★★★☆ Excellent
- Very favorable conditions, close to ideal.
- ★★★☆☆ Good
- Generally favorable conditions with one or two factors slightly off-ideal.
- ★★☆☆☆ Fair
- Mixed conditions -- worth checking, but don't count on dramatic color.
- ★☆☆☆☆ Poor
- Thick low cloud, heavy rain chance, or very poor visibility is likely to block the light entirely.
Today
Every light band and sun event for the selected day, laid out as a set of cards -- from sunrise through golden hour, blue hour, and each stage of twilight, to sunset and back again. This is the fastest way to see exactly what kind of light a given day will have and when.
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Elevation thresholds: daytime is above −0.8° (astronomical convention); golden/magic hour −4° to +6°; blue hour −4° to −8°; civil twilight −0.8° to −6°; nautical twilight −6° to −12°; astronomical twilight −12° to −18°; true night below −18°.
- Astronomical twilight
- The sun is between about −12° and −18° below the horizon. The sky is essentially dark to the naked eye, but residual sunlight can still faintly wash out the dimmest stars and the Milky Way.
- Blue hour
- The period just before sunrise and just after sunset (roughly −4° to −8° elevation) when the sun is below the horizon but its scattered light still tints the sky a deep blue. Popular for cityscape and architectural photography, since ambient and artificial light balance evenly.
- Civil twilight
- The sun is between about −0.8° and −6° below the horizon. There's still enough light to see outdoors without artificial lighting, and the horizon is clearly visible -- the brightest stage of twilight.
- Golden hour
- The window when the sun sits low in the sky (roughly −4° to +6° elevation), producing warm, soft, low-angle light with long shadows -- favored for portraits, landscapes, and cityscapes. It happens once after sunrise and once before sunset, and is sometimes called "magic hour."
- Nautical twilight
- The sun is between about −6° and −12° below the horizon. The horizon is still faintly visible against the sky, historically enough for sailors to navigate by the stars while using the horizon as a reference -- hence the name.
- True night
- The sun is more than 18° below the horizon. No sunlight remains in the atmosphere at all -- the darkest sky the sun's position alone can produce, before accounting for the moon or light pollution.
Almanac
A day-by-day table of sunrise, sunset, golden hour, and twilight times for your selected location -- useful for planning a shoot or trip more than a day or two out, where the card and graph views are less convenient than a scannable list.
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24-Hour Graph
A 24-hour view of daylight, golden hour, blue hour, and twilight bands for your selected date, plotted against the sun's elevation curve -- a visual alternative to the Today and Almanac tabs for seeing exactly how each light band relates to the others across the full day.
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Year Graph
How golden hour and daylight timing shift across the year at your selected location, from the shortest day near the winter solstice to the longest near the summer solstice. Useful for spotting seasonal patterns -- like which months give the longest golden hour, or how fast sunset creeps later after the spring equinox.
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Map
Which regions of the world are currently in golden hour, blue hour, or twilight, drawn live on a map. Slide through the day or step through dates to watch the terminator -- the line dividing day from night -- sweep across the globe, and see exactly where the light is good right now.
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- Graticule
- The grid of latitude and longitude reference lines drawn over the map. It's a coordinate overlay, not a political or coastline boundary.
- Terminator
- The moving boundary line between the sunlit half of the Earth and the half in darkness. It isn't a hard edge -- the golden hour, blue hour, and twilight bands on this map are the gradual transition zone straddling it.
24-Hour Forecast
An hour-by-hour cloud cover, precipitation, and visibility forecast for the next 24 hours -- the same underlying weather data behind the Outlook tab's star ratings, shown in full detail so you can judge conditions for yourself hour by hour.
| Time | Condition | Temp | Precip % | Precip amt | Humidity | Cloud cover | Dew point | Wind |
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14-Day Forecast
A 14-day weather outlook to help plan ahead for good golden hour conditions -- handy for scheduling a shoot, trip, or outdoor event further in advance than the hourly forecast reaches, keeping in mind that day-14 accuracy is inherently rougher than day-1.
| Date | Condition | High / Low | Precip % | Precip amt | Humidity | Cloud cover | Wind |
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