Finnmark, NorwayMagnetic latitude 66.9°Population 2,53680 m above sea level
Northern lights in Bjørnevatn
Bjørnevatn sits right under the auroral oval: on clear, dark nights the aurora is often overhead, even when activity is quiet. Clouds matter far more than the Kp number here.
Right now
The aurora may be in view right now — go outside and look north!
Magnetometer at Kevo (115 km away): moderate magnetic activity, aurora likely under a dark, clear sky.
Updates every minute while this page is open. Ground data: FMI MIRACLE R-index (CC BY 4.0).
Tonight in one minute
Yes — good chance tonight
- Solar activity Strong enough: Kp 2.3 expected, 0 needed here.
- Sky Mostly clear (29% cloud).
- Darkness Dark from 18:21 to 05:10.
What to do: Go somewhere dark around 00:00, give your eyes 15 minutes to adjust and look north, low over the horizon.
- Detailed forecast Sat 17 2.3 Good chance · Kp 2.3
- Sun 18 2 Good chance · Kp 2
- Mon 19 4 Possible · Kp 4
- 27-day trend Tue 20 3 Good chance · Kp 3
- Wed 21 4 Good chance · Kp 4
- Thu 22 4 Possible · Kp 4
- Fri 23 4 Possible · Kp 4
- Sat 24 3 Possible · Kp 3
- Sun 25 2 Possible · Kp 2
- Mon 26 2 Possible · Kp 2
- Tue 27 2 Possible · Kp 2
- Wed 28 2 Possible · Kp 2
- Thu 29 2 Possible · Kp 2
- Fri 30 5 Possible · Kp 5
- Sat 31 5 Possible · Kp 5
- Sun 1 5 Possible · Kp 5
- Mon 2 3 Possible · Kp 3
- Tue 3 2 Possible · Kp 2
- Wed 4 2 Possible · Kp 2
- Thu 5 3 Possible · Kp 3
- Fri 6 3 Possible · Kp 3
- Sat 7 3 Possible · Kp 3
Sunday 18 October — Good chance · Kp 2.3 · best around 00:30 · Forecast cloud: 29%. · Reliability: good
Each box is one night: the colour shows the chance, the number the expected Kp. Tap a night for details.
📅 Add these nights to your calendar — it updates itself (.ics)
How far ahead can the northern lights be forecast?
- Minutes to an hour: satellites 1.5 million km away measure the solar wind before it reaches Earth. This is the surest warning — the “Right now” box uses it.
- 1–3 days: when the Sun throws out a cloud of particles, it takes one to three days to arrive. NOAA's 3-hourly forecast covers these nights; the timing can still be off by a few hours.
- 4–27 days: the Sun turns once every 27 days, and regions that disturbed Earth's field last time often do it again. NOAA's 27-day outlook gives this rough trend — new eruptions are not in it yet.
Tonight
Updated 23:02 local time
Excellent chance
Best around 00:00. Forecast max Kp 2.3 (this place needs 0), average cloud 29%.
- Dark enough
- 18:21 – 05:10
- Sunset
- 16:05 · sunrise 07:27
- Moon
- 43%
- Kp neededKp index: a 0–9 measure of geomagnetic activity. The higher it is, the further from the poles the aurora reaches.
- Kp 0
- Look towards
- north (356°)
Cloud layers and weather
Low cloud blocks the aurora completely. Thin high cloud often still lets a bright aurora shine through, so a sky with only high cloud is worth a look.
| Time | Sat, 23 | Sun, 02 | Sun, 05 | Sun, 20 | Sun, 23 | Mon, 02 | Mon, 05 | Mon, 20 | Mon, 23 | Tue, 02 | Tue, 05 | Tue, 20 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Low cloud | 4% | 8% | 25% | 72% | 39% | 6% | 1% | 7% | 33% | 17% | 45% | 100% |
| Mid cloud | 2% | 5% | 9% | 99% | 30% | 11% | 39% | 66% | 73% | 57% | 47% | 3% |
| High cloud | 0% | 0% | 0% | 59% | 0% | 34% | 87% | 88% | 94% | 79% | 95% | 0% |
| Temperature | 0 °C | 0 °C | 0 °C | 3 °C | 2 °C | 1 °C | 1 °C | 7 °C | 7 °C | 8 °C | 8 °C | 8 °C |
| Feels like | -5 °C | -5 °C | -6 °C | -3 °C | -4 °C | -4 °C | -5 °C | -2 °C | -1 °C | 2 °C | 4 °C | 4 °C |
| Wind | 5 m/s | 5 m/s | 6 m/s | 6 m/s | 7 m/s | 6 m/s | 8 m/s | 13 m/s | 12 m/s | 9 m/s | 7 m/s | 3 m/s |
| Visibility | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km | 50 km |
Cloud layers and weather: Open-Meteo (CC BY 4.0).
Score = activity (NOAA Kp and OVATION) × clear sky (MET Norway) × darkness × moonlight. Methodology
Seeing it right now?
Tell others in Finnmark. Reports from real visitors move a place up the live ranking.
Reports are anonymous: we do not store your IP address or location. One report per place every few hours.
Live webcams near Bjørnevatn
Check the sky for yourself: public cameras within 300 km. They open on the camera owner's website.
- Kirkenes – Bøkfjorden (opens in a new tab) Scenic
- Kevo all-sky camera (opens in a new tab) All-sky
- Saariselkä & Lake Inari (opens in a new tab) Scenic
- Honningsvåg (North Cape) (opens in a new tab) Scenic
- Skarsvåg, North Cape (opens in a new tab) Scenic
These cameras belong to their owners — we only link to them. Most show little in daylight or under cloud, and some pause in summer.
What you would see from Bjørnevatn
Facing north. Bands show where the aurora sits at two activity levels.
| Kp | What you see | Lower edge | Ray tops | Distance to the aurora |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 0 | Overhead and all around | – | – | – |
| 2 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
| 3 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
| 4 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
| 5 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
| 6 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
| 7 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
| 8 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
| 9 | Overhead, and also to the south | – | – | – |
The Kp scale in plain words
Kp is a 0–9 score for how strongly the Earth's magnetic field is being shaken by the solar wind. The higher it goes, the further from the poles the northern lights reach. Kp 0–2 is a quiet night; Kp 5 and above is a geomagnetic storm.
- Kp 0–2 Quiet next 24 h eye in Bjørnevatn Only under the auroral oval: northern Norway, Swedish and Finnish Lapland, Iceland, Alaska, northern Canada.
- Kp 3 Unsettled Bright in the Arctic; low on the horizon in central Scandinavia and southern Iceland.
- Kp 4 Active Overhead in the Arctic; low in the north from southern Norway, Sweden, Finland and northern Scotland.
- Kp 5 Minor storm (G1) Scotland, southern Scandinavia, the Baltic states, the northern US states and southern Canada.
- Kp 6 Moderate storm (G2) Northern England, Denmark, northern Germany and Poland, the US Midwest — often clearer in photos than to the eye.
- Kp 7 Strong storm (G3) Most of the UK, the Netherlands, Germany, Poland, Czechia; red glow in photos from France and the northern Alps.
- Kp 8 Severe storm (G4) Central Europe to the eye; red sky in photos from northern Italy, Spain, the Balkans and Turkey's Black Sea coast.
- Kp 9 Extreme storm (G5) Seen across Europe and the US; in photos as far south as the Mediterranean, Turkey and North Africa (May 2024).
Light pollution
Rural to suburban. Some sky glow from nearby lights. Moderate displays are fine; faint ones are easier a few kilometres out.
A noticeably darker area starts about 5 km to the south-south-east. Open in OpenStreetMap
Estimate from NASA VIIRS night-light data (sky-glow model within 50 km). Check access and private land before you go.
Hills and mountains
The horizon towards the north is open (terrain below 1.9°), so low aurora is not blocked.
From elevation data (AWS Terrain Tiles) along seven lines of sight up to 30 km.
Best months to see the aurora in Bjørnevatn
Share of nights 2005–2025 that were dark, active enough here and mostly clear.
September has been the best month (24% of nights), followed by March (18%).
| Month | Good nights | Clear nights | Darkness | Low / high |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| September | 24% | 27% | 5.4 h | 5° / 9°C |
| October | 13% | 13% | 10.3 h | 0° / 3°C |
| November | 13% | 13% | 13.9 h | -5° / -1°C |
| December | 15% | 15% | 15.6 h | -8° / -4°C |
| January | 14% | 14% | 14.9 h | -10° / -5°C |
| February | 11% | 11% | 11.6 h | -10° / -5°C |
| March | 18% | 18% | 7.6 h | -7° / -3°C |
| April | 5% | 20% | 0.9 h | -4° / 0°C |
Darkness through the year
- No full darkness (Sun 12° below the horizon) from 11 April to 1 September — the sky stays too bright for most auroras.
- Midnight sun from 19 May to 24 July.
- Polar night from 29 November to 13 January: the sun stays below the horizon, giving the longest viewing windows.
- Next new moon 9 November, next full moon 26 October. The darkest skies are in the week around new moon.
Aurora nights in Bjørnevatn since 1995
Nights when Kp reached 4.7 or more while it was dark here.
Most recent strong nights
- 10 October 2026 · Kp 7.3
- 4 October 2026 · Kp 5.7
- 3 April 2026 · Kp 5.7
- 2 April 2026 · Kp 5.0
- 22 March 2026 · Kp 6.7
- 20 March 2026 · Kp 7.0
- 13 March 2026 · Kp 6.0
- 3 March 2026 · Kp 5.0
Practical information
- Nearest airport
- Kirkenes Airport, Høybuktmoen (KKN) · 7 km
- Typical low / high in September
- 5° / 9°C
- What to wear
- Cool nights: layers, a windproof jacket, hat and gloves for standing still outside. Full clothing guide
- Emergency number
- 112 (police), 113 (ambulance), 110 (fire)
- Winter driving
- Winter tyres need at least 3 mm of tread from 1 November to the first Sunday after Easter Monday (16 October to 30 April in Nordland, Troms and Finnmark). Studded tyres are allowed in the same periods and outside them when conditions require. Road conditions are on Statens vegvesen's traffic information service (vegvesen.no/trafikk). Road conditions
- Access to land
- Allemannsretten gives free access to uncultivated land (utmark) such as forest, mountain and shoreline; cultivated land and yards (innmark) need the owner's consent. Overnight stays, including tents, motorhomes and vans, must be more than 150 m from an inhabited house or cabin, and you may stay at most two nights in one spot without permission.
- Official space-weather service
- Norwegian Centre for Space Weather (NOSWE), Tromsø Geophysical Observatory, UiT
- Weather service
- Norwegian Meteorological Institute (Yr)
Questions and answers
What Kp do you need to see the aurora in Bjørnevatn?
Bjørnevatn sits right under the auroral oval: on clear, dark nights the aurora is often overhead, even when activity is quiet. Clouds matter far more than the Kp number here.
Which way should I look for the aurora in Bjørnevatn?
Around Bjørnevatn the aurora is often right overhead. Start by facing north, but look up and all around — in strong storms it can fill the whole sky and even appear behind you.
What is the best month to see the aurora in Bjørnevatn?
Over 2005–2025, September gave the best odds in Bjørnevatn (24% of nights dark, active enough and mostly clear), followed by March (18%).
When is the aurora season in Bjørnevatn?
From 11 April to 1 September the sky in Bjørnevatn never gets dark enough. Outside that period the aurora can be seen whenever activity and clouds allow.
Is there much light pollution in Bjørnevatn?
Some sky glow from nearby lights. Moderate displays are fine; faint ones are easier a few kilometres out. A noticeably darker area starts about 5 km to the south-south-east.
When was the aurora last possible in Bjørnevatn?
Activity last reached storm level (Kp 5 or more) during darkness in Bjørnevatn on 10 October 2026 (Kp 7.3) — 740 such nights since 1995. Here the aurora also appears on many quieter nights.
Also covered by this forecast
Villages and districts around Bjørnevatn share its forecast: within a few kilometres the sky, the Kp needed and the best direction are the same.
- Sandnes 2 km
- Hesseng 2 km
- Bjørndal 5 km
- Langvasseid 9 km
- Munkefjord 19 km
- Munkelv 21 km
- Kotala 22 km
- Indre Neiden 23 km
- Skoltebyen 24 km
- Neiden 24 km