Northern lights in Longyearbyen

6 min read Updated October 2026 Compare all tours

Longyearbyen sits at about 78 degrees north. In the polar night the sky stays dark for weeks, and Visit Svalbard points out that you can see the northern lights in the middle of the day if you are lucky. Aurora tours here are therefore not tied to late evening.

The street lights of town wash out the weaker displays, and Visit Svalbard notes that they are easier to see from outside the settlement. Outside, though, polar bear rules apply: everyone must carry suitable means of scaring off a bear, and visitors are advised not to leave town without a guide. That is why most visitors watch from a tour.

Dark weeks and the edges of the season

According to the US Naval Observatory, the sun stays below the horizon in Longyearbyen from 27 October 2026 to 15 February 2027. Between 13 November and 29 January there is not even twilight at noon. Visit Svalbard uses 11 November to 30 January for its polar night, which roughly matches that darkest phase, and gives October to the end of February as the northern lights winter. Its own FAQ is a little wider, from late September to mid-March.

Towards spring the dark hours shrink quickly. On 1 March the sun is up from 08:29 to 15:53, and by 18 April the sky stays above the twilight limit all night. From then until late August there is no darkness for the aurora at all, which is the price of the midnight sun. Our page on polar night and midnight sun has the dates for the whole year.

By car or van

The shortest tour lasts two hours and takes at most six guests in a car or van. The guide follows the forecast to dark places, and you wait in the vehicle or outside while coffee, tea and hot chocolate come out with light snacks. There is no bonfire, and winter clothing is not provided. Reviewers praise guides who found a gap in the clouds on a rainy night, while others went home without seeing the lights.

A three-hour tour drives up Adventdalen with a stop at the Global Seed Vault and continues toward the old Gruve 3 mine, visiting two or three places in the dark. The guide is a photographer; if you have no camera of your own, you can buy the guide's pictures at the end and receive them the same night. Children under 6 cannot join.

The van tour above names the Northern Lights Observatory and Gruve 5 among its stops and states plainly that sightings cannot be guaranteed. One reviewer warns that it is too dark to see anything else on the way, so do not expect sightseeing.

A four-hour photography tour also collects you from your accommodation and drives to photo spots, where photographer guides help you set up your camera. One reviewer found it aimed more at smartphone pictures than at serious photography, and children under 6 cannot join. If there is no aurora, there is no refund.

On a snowmobile

For a ride instead of a drive, the private snowmobile tour puts you on the back of a machine while the guide drives. It heads into Adventdalen and stops at dark viewpoints according to the forecast, for about three hours with pick-up and drop-off. The operator expects cold, wind and a bumpy ride, serves hot drinks and snacks rather than a meal, and asks you to wear a wool base layer. Children under 12 cannot join.

The other option is to drive yourself on a beginner tour of 3.5 hours, which teaches you to handle the snowmobile at a relaxed pace and mentions the aurora only if conditions are right. You need a valid driving licence. Our page on snowmobile tours explains the licence rules and the longer day trips.

Picking a tour

Group size is the clearest difference. The two-hour car tour stops at six guests and needs at least two to run, the three-hour tour through Adventdalen calls itself small-group, and the snowmobile tour is private. Longer tours give the guide more time to move between spots when clouds roll in. Shorter ones leave you less time standing in the cold.

Languages vary too. Most tours run in English; the van tour also offers Norwegian, Polish and Czech, and the Adventdalen tour Italian and Spanish. All of them collect you from your accommodation, and several include hot drinks and snacks. If you would like to see the Global Seed Vault entrance as well, the Adventdalen tour stops there on the way, where the entrance carries a light installation by the artist Dyveke Sanne; daytime tours are described on our Global Seed Vault page.

For a longer snowmobile day in better light, look at the spring tours to Barentsburg and Tempelfjorden, which run once the sun is back.

Forecasts and weather

Visit Svalbard recommends two tools. Yr, the weather service of MET Norway and the broadcaster NRK, works on Svalbard. For the aurora itself it points to Aurora Forecast 3D, an app developed by Professor Fred Sigernes at the University Centre in Svalbard (UNIS). The weather on Svalbard is unpredictable and changes quickly. If the aurora matters to you, book a tour early in your stay so that you still have nights left if the first one is cloudy.

All the tours here can be cancelled free of charge up to 24 hours before the start. That gives you a little room when the forecast turns against you.

Staying warm while you wait

An aurora tour means standing still in the cold. MET Norway gives a normal of about −5.5 °C for the start of November and −7.8 °C for the start of December at Svalbard Airport, and monthly averages of −10.9 °C in January and −11.6 °C in February. Visit Svalbard warns that winter temperatures can drop towards −30 °C and that strong wind makes it feel colder still. The tourist board recommends a windproof outer layer with several layers of wool or fleece underneath. Our page on what to wear goes through the list, and the page on polar bear safety explains why visitors go out with a guide.