Weather & Flight
Golden Hour Calculator
Sunrise, sunset, golden hour and blue hour for any location and date.
Planning aid only — not certified flight-planning software or airspace clearance. Always verify results against your own aircraft's manual and check current regulations before flying. Full disclaimer.
What each time means
All times are shown in the local time zone of the place you picked, not your device's time zone, so you can plan a trip abroad from home. Each row marks a specific sun position:
| Row | Sun position | What the light is like |
|---|---|---|
| Blue hour (morning) | 12° below the horizon (nautical dawn) | Deep blue sky; the ground is still dark |
| Golden hour (morning) starts | 6° below the horizon (civil dawn) | Sky brightening; enough light to see the ground clearly |
| Sunrise | Top of the sun appears | Warm, low, direct light begins |
| Golden hour (morning) ends | 6° above the horizon | Light becomes whiter and shadows shorter |
| Golden hour (evening) starts | 6° above the horizon | Warm light and long shadows return |
| Sunset | Top of the sun disappears | Direct light ends; the sky often colours up |
| Golden hour (evening) ends | 6° below the horizon (civil dusk) | Bright sky, dark landscape |
| Blue hour (evening) ends | 12° below the horizon (nautical dusk) | Nearly dark |
Photographers don't all use the same definitions. Some end the golden hour at sunset and start the blue hour there. The sun positions above are the ones the calculator uses, so you can compare any two places and dates on the same basis.
Planning a flight with these times
Take off before the light you want. Allow time to set up, calibrate and fly to your shooting position. If you want the last 20 minutes before sunset, be airborne about 30 minutes before.
Count batteries, not minutes. A typical drone battery gives 20–30 minutes of real flying. Near the equator, the evening golden hour is under an hour from start to civil dusk, so one or two batteries is all you get. In northern Europe in summer it can last two to three hours.
Know when twilight becomes night for the rules. Civil dusk, the "Golden hour (evening) ends" row, is close to where many regulations draw the line between twilight and night. In the US, Part 107 requires anti-collision lighting from 30 minutes after official sunset, and night rules apply after that. Our guide to golden hour drone photography explains the rules and the weather to check.
Check the weather for the same time window. The calculator is purely astronomical: it doesn't know about clouds, haze or wind. A bank of cloud on the horizon can cut the golden light short. Run the same window through Flight Window to check wind, cloud cover and visibility.
Where the sun will be
The calculator tells you when, not where. The sun rises and sets north of due east and west in summer and south of them in winter (the reverse in the Southern Hemisphere), and the difference grows with latitude. When you scout a location, note which way the sunrise or sunset will fall across your subject. Side light shows shape and texture, while shooting straight into the sun gives silhouettes.
Why the times change with location
Two places in the same time zone can have sunsets more than an hour apart. The time zone is fixed for a whole region, but the sun sets later the further west you go within it. Latitude and date change the length of the golden hour itself. That is why the calculator needs your exact location and date rather than just a city or time zone.