About the Golden Hour Calculator
This golden hour calculator works out when the soft, warm light that photographers love begins and ends on any date and anywhere on Earth. Enter a latitude and longitude, the date and the UTC offset in force that day, and it returns the morning and evening golden hours, the morning and evening blue hours, sunrise, sunset and solar noon, along with a chart of the sun’s height through the day.
Landscape, portrait and wedding photographers use it to plan shoots around flattering low-angle light, and videographers use it to schedule the deep-blue twilight of the blue hour for city skylines. Because it calculates from the sun’s actual position, it also handles high latitudes, where summer golden hours can last for hours and winter days may never rise above the golden-hour band.
Golden hour is defined here as the period when the centre of the sun is between 4° below and 6° above the horizon, and blue hour as the period between 6° and 4° below — the definition used by most photography planning apps. You can change the upper golden-hour limit. Times are local clock times for the UTC offset you enter, so include daylight saving time.
How to use the golden hour calculator
- 1Enter the latitude and longitude of your location (copy them from any online map).
- 2Choose the date of your shoot.
- 3Enter the UTC offset that applies on that date, including daylight saving time.
- 4Optionally change the elevation at which golden hour ends (6° by default).
- 5Read the golden and blue hour windows and plan to arrive before they start.
Formula and method
The sun’s declination δ and the equation of time are computed with the NOAA Solar Calculator equations (based on Jean Meeus’s Astronomical Algorithms) for the date. For each target elevation h — 6° and −4° for golden hour, −4° and −6° for blue hour, and −0.833° for sunrise and sunset (allowing for refraction and the sun’s radius) — the hour angle H is solved from the formula above at latitude φ, then converted to a clock time at 4 minutes per degree either side of solar noon. The calculation is repeated a few times so the declination matches the event time.
If the formula has no solution the sun never crosses that elevation on that date, which happens near the poles; the calculator then reports whether the sun stays above or below the band. Results are typically within a minute of published almanac times; terrain, buildings and weather change what you actually see.
- h
- Target sun elevation (degrees)
- φ
- Latitude of the location
- δ
- Solar declination on the date
- H
- Hour angle from solar noon (degrees)
Worked examples
New York City on the June solstice
On 21 June 2026 in New York (UTC−4), the sun rises at about 05:25 and sets at about 20:31. Evening golden hour runs from about 19:49, when the sun drops to 6°, until 20:51 when it is 4° below the horizon (about 62 minutes), and blue hour follows until about 21:04.
London in mid-December
In London in winter the sun peaks only about 15° above the horizon, so the light stays low all day. Sunset is around 15:52, and because the sun sets at a shallow angle the evening golden hour lasts about 86 minutes, from roughly 14:50 to 16:17.
Tromsø, Norway at midsummer (midnight sun)
Far inside the Arctic Circle the sun never sets in June: its lowest point, around 00:46, is still about 3° above the horizon. It dips below 6° at about 22:35 and climbs back above it at 02:57, giving one golden period of about 4 hours 22 minutes across midnight, but it never gets low enough for a blue hour.
Frequently asked questions
What time is golden hour?+
Golden hour is roughly the first hour after sunrise and the last hour before sunset, when the sun is low. More precisely, it is when the sun is between about 6° above and 4° below the horizon, so its exact time and length depend on your latitude and the date.
How long does golden hour last?+
Near the equator it can be as short as 25–30 minutes because the sun sets steeply. At mid-latitudes it is usually 50–80 minutes, and close to the Arctic or Antarctic circles it can last for hours in summer.
What is blue hour?+
Blue hour is the part of twilight when the sun is between about 4° and 6° below the horizon. The sky turns a deep, even blue that balances well with city lights, which makes it popular for architecture and night-scene photography.
Is golden hour before or after sunset?+
Both. Evening golden hour begins while the sun is still about 6° high, continues through sunset and ends a little after it, when the sun is 4° below the horizon. In the morning the order is reversed.
Why do different apps give slightly different golden hour times?+
There is no official definition. Some apps end golden hour when the sun reaches 6°, others at 10°, and some start it at sunset rather than 4° below. This calculator lets you change the upper limit to match your preference.