Sky guide, 40.7°N
The night sky over New York
What changes through the year in the sky above New York: how dark it gets, which constellations you can and cannot see, and what the eclipses and meteor showers of 2026 and 2027 look like from here.
Open the live sky for New York
Sunrise, sunset and darkness through 2026
New York is at 40.7°N. The table gives sunrise, sunset and day length on the 15th of each month in local time (America/New_York), and the hours of full astronomical darkness, when the Sun is more than 18 degrees below the horizon and the faintest stars and the Milky Way show. The longest dark nights are around December, with about 11 h 27 min of darkness.
| Month | Sunrise | Sunset | Day length | Full darkness |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 07:17 | 16:53 | 9 h 36 min | 11 h 11 min |
| February | 06:49 | 17:30 | 10 h 41 min | 10 h 14 min |
| March | 07:07 | 19:02 | 11 h 55 min | 9 h 00 min |
| April | 06:17 | 19:35 | 13 h 18 min | 7 h 23 min |
| May | 05:38 | 20:06 | 14 h 27 min | 5 h 45 min |
| June | 05:24 | 20:28 | 15 h 05 min | 4 h 43 min |
| July | 05:37 | 20:25 | 14 h 48 min | 5 h 14 min |
| August | 06:06 | 19:53 | 13 h 47 min | 6 h 48 min |
| September | 06:36 | 19:04 | 12 h 28 min | 8 h 27 min |
| October | 07:07 | 18:15 | 11 h 08 min | 9 h 51 min |
| November | 06:42 | 16:37 | 9 h 55 min | 10 h 56 min |
| December | 07:12 | 16:29 | 9 h 17 min | 11 h 27 min |
Constellations and your latitude
How much of the sky you can see depends on latitude. From New York, in the northern hemisphere, 3 constellations never set: Camelopardalis, Cepheus and Ursa Minor. 14 never rise above the horizon: Apus, Carina, Chamaeleon, Circinus, Crux, Hydrus, Mensa, Musca, Octans, Pavo, Reticulum, Triangulum Australe, Tucana and Volans. 14 more only partly clear it: Ara, Centaurus, Dorado, Eridanus, Grus, Horologium, Indus, Lupus, Norma, Phoenix, Pictor, Puppis, Telescopium and Vela. These come from the IAU's constellation boundaries and are geometric, so they ignore haze, hills and buildings near the horizon.
Eclipses from New York, 2026 and 2027
| Date | Eclipse | From New York |
|---|---|---|
| 17 Feb 2026 | Annular solar eclipse | Not visible from here |
| 3 Mar 2026 | Total lunar eclipse | Not visible from here |
| 12 Aug 2026 | Total solar eclipse | Visible from here: 9% of the Sun is covered at the peak, with the Sun 62° up. The greatest eclipse is near 65°N, 25°W. Never look at the Sun without proper eclipse glasses. |
| 28 Aug 2026 | Partial lunar eclipse | The partial phase lasts about 199 minutes. From here the Moon is 38° up at the peak. |
| 6 Feb 2027 | Annular solar eclipse | Not visible from here |
| 20 Feb 2027 | Penumbral lunar eclipse | A penumbral eclipse is a faint shading that is hard to see by eye. From here the Moon is 6° up at the peak. |
| 18 Jul 2027 | Penumbral lunar eclipse | Not visible from here |
| 2 Aug 2027 | Total solar eclipse | Not visible from here |
| 17 Aug 2027 | Penumbral lunar eclipse | A penumbral eclipse is a faint shading that is hard to see by eye. From here the Moon is 28° up at the peak. |
Meteor showers: how high the radiant gets
The radiant is the point a meteor shower seems to stream from; the higher it climbs, the better the shower works. This is the highest each radiant gets from New York. See the meteor shower table for peak dates and the Moon.
| Shower | Highest radiant | Peak | ZHR |
|---|---|---|---|
| Lyrids | 83° | 23 Apr | 18 |
| Quadrantids | 82° | 4 Jan | 80 |
| Geminids | 82° | 14 Dec | 150 |
| Draconids | 75° | 9 Oct | 5 |
| Perseids | 73° | 13 Aug | 110 |
| Leonids | 71° | 18 Nov | 15 |
| Orionids | 65° | 22 Oct | 20 |
| Southern Taurids | 64° | 6 Nov | 7 |
| Eta Aquariids | 48° | 6 May | 50 |
| Southern Delta Aquariids | 33° | 31 Jul | 25 |
How this was worked out
Sun and darkness times come from the astronomy-engine library. The sunrise and sunset times on both 2026 solstices at this and five other places were compared with the US Naval Observatory's tables (20 times) and the largest difference was 30 seconds. The other mid-month figures use the same calculation but were not compared one by one. Constellation visibility comes from the IAU boundaries.
Sources
- astronomy-engine. The MIT licensed library that does the calculations, run on the page's build machine and in the app
- IAU: The Constellations. Names, meanings, pronunciations and boundaries
- U.S. Naval Observatory, Astronomical Applications API. Used to check the solstice sunrise and sunset times