Social media is full of posts telling you to see the aurora borealis before it vanishes. Ignore the panic. The sun has simply moved past its 11-year peak of activity (solar maximum), which produced those wild 2024 displays as far south as Texas and Florida. The quiet phase, solar minimum, is expected around 2030 — and that doesn't mean the lights stop. It means you'll need to travel further north to see them well.
There's a genuine upside here, according to aurora chaser and University of Alaska Fairbanks doctoral student Vince Ledvina. The years after solar maximum bring more coronal holes on the sun, which boost solar wind — the charged-particle flow that fuels auroras. That translates to more regular, reliable displays at high latitudes. The trade-off: the auroral oval won't swell toward the lower 48 as often. If you live along the US-Canada border in Minnesota or Wisconsin, you might still catch a faint, horizon-hugging glow once a month, often only through a phone camera. For a real show, aim for latitudes between roughly 60 and 75 degrees.
Where to go? Fairbanks, Alaska sits on the southern edge of the auroral oval and is arguably the best US option — strong displays are visible from downtown, though a guided tour or a stay at Borealis Basecamp's clear-walled igloos beats fighting city lights. Ilulissat, Greenland sits inside the Arctic Circle and the oval itself; reach it via Nuuk from Iceland or Denmark, then watch the lights over icebergs from Hotel Arctic's heated glass Aurora Cabins. Yellowknife, Canada offers oval-centre positioning, drier inland skies, and guides like Indigenous lights tracker Joe Buffalo Child who add cultural context to the show. And Iceland's remote Westfjords — about five hours from Reykjavik — deliver some of the country's darkest skies; the author's favourite base is Heydalur, a guest house and horse farm where you can soak in a hot spring while the sky does its thing.
Timing matters in these northern spots, where summer's midnight sun kills all darkness. The aurora season runs from about mid-August into April. The equinoxes (especially late September and March) may bump up geomagnetic activity via the Russell-McPherron effect — not guaranteed, but a useful tiebreaker, plus you get daylight hours for other adventures. March is reportedly the clearest month around Fairbanks.
One last practical point: budget your nights generously. Three nights may be enough to tick the box, but faint or phone-only sightings are common. If you want the eye-popping red-and-lime swirls worth the airfare, plan five to seven nights. That gives the odds time to swing your way for a proper geomagnetic storm — the kind that turns a first viewing into a lifelong habit.