Select a date and city to calculate sunrise, sunset, solar noon, and golden hour. Powered by pure astronomical algorithms (NOAA) — no API required.
Earth orbits the Sun tilted at 23.5°. This axial tilt causes seasons and shifts the length of day and night throughout the year, moving the sunrise time a little each day. Additionally, Earth's orbit is elliptical rather than circular, so it speeds up and slows down, creating a small difference between clock time and the true solar position — known as the equation of time.
The golden hour refers to the roughly one-hour period just after sunrise and just before sunset. During this time, the sun sits low on the horizon, so its light travels a longer path through the atmosphere. This scatters shorter blue wavelengths and lets warm orange and golden hues dominate, producing soft, diffuse light and long shadows — ideal conditions for photography and videography.
Solar noon is the moment when the sun reaches its highest point in the sky for the day. It does not always coincide with 12:00 PM clock time because of the equation of time (variations in Earth's orbital speed) and the difference between your actual longitude and the center of your time zone. At solar noon, shadows are at their shortest and point directly toward true north or south.