The Solar Cycle and the Northern Lights: What an 11-Year Rhythm Means for Your Trip

Aurora is possible at any point in the solar cycle — clear skies and a location beneath the auroral oval will produce results regardless of where the sun is in its roughly 11-year rhythm. But the solar cycle does affect how often intense displays occur and how far south aurora can reach, which makes it worth understanding when you're deciding when to travel.

What the Solar Cycle Is

The sun's activity level rises and falls on an approximately 11-year cycle, measured primarily by the count of sunspots visible on its surface. At solar minimum, the sun is relatively quiet — fewer sunspots, fewer flares, fewer coronal mass ejections. At solar maximum, activity peaks: sunspot numbers are high, active regions are frequent, and the rate of significant solar events increases considerably.

What helped me picture the cycle: think of it like a slow tide. The ocean is always present — the sun always produces solar wind, and aurora always occurs at high latitudes — but at high tide, the water reaches further inland. Solar maximum is high tide for aurora. The oval expands more frequently, storms push aurora further south, and the nights that produce full-sky displays become more common.

The cycle isn't perfectly regular — some maxima are stronger than others, and the timing can vary by a year or more from the average. But the general pattern is consistent enough that scientists have been tracking numbered solar cycles since the 18th century.

Where We Are Now

Solar Cycle 25 began in December 2019 and reached its peak around 2025–2026 — making this one of the more active periods for aurora in recent memory. The years surrounding solar maximum tend to produce the highest frequency of significant geomagnetic storms, and Cycle 25 has already delivered several notable events that brought aurora to unusually low latitudes. For more on how the current cycle has affected aurora activity, see our overview of solar cycles and the northern lights.

What the Solar Cycle Means for Aurora Travelers

The most practical implication of the solar cycle for travelers is storm frequency. Near solar maximum, significant geomagnetic storms — the kind that produce bright, widespread, multi-colored aurora — occur more often. Near solar minimum, those events are rarer, but moderate activity from coronal holes continues throughout the cycle and can still produce excellent displays at high-latitude destinations.

This is an important distinction. A trip to Fairbanks during solar minimum is not a wasted trip. The auroral oval sits over the region regardless of the solar cycle, and coronal hole activity keeps geomagnetic conditions elevated on a recurring basis. What changes near minimum is the probability of the most intense events — the ones that produce full-sky corona or push aurora deep into the mid-latitudes. Those become less frequent but don't disappear entirely.

For travelers who have flexibility in when they go, the years around solar maximum offer better odds of witnessing an exceptional night. Our Northern Lights Tour in Fairbanks operates during the prime winter viewing season — and with Cycle 25 near its peak, conditions are as favorable as they've been in over a decade. For more on how to time a trip, see our guide on the best time to see the northern lights in Alaska.

What the Solar Cycle Means for Photographers

For photographers, the solar cycle affects the frequency of the conditions that produce the most technically challenging and visually rewarding aurora. Near solar maximum, fast-moving substorms and multi-colored displays become more common — which means more opportunities to capture aurora at its most dynamic, but also more situations that demand quick adjustments to exposure settings.

Near minimum, aurora photography tends to involve more patient, methodical shooting of slower-moving structure. Both have their photographic merits. Some photographers find the calmer pace of solar minimum aurora easier to work with compositionally, while the intensity of maximum-era events produces images that are harder to replicate in quieter periods.

Longer term, the solar cycle is one of the factors that makes certain years stand out in aurora photography communities. The major storm events that produce iconic images — aurora over recognizable landmarks far south of the normal viewing zone — cluster around solar maximum. If capturing that kind of once-in-a-decade shot is part of your motivation, the years surrounding peak activity are the window to prioritize.

Return to the full Northern Lights Glossary to continue through the Solar Physics and Space Weather section.