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If you are investing in a trip to chase the aurora, you want to pick a location that gives you the best chance of success. Heading to the Arctic isn’t enough; you need to be under the auroral oval. In the northern hemisphere, this circle of geomagnetic activity concentrates around Earth’s North Magnetic Pole, which is south of the Geographic North Pole. As a result, the auroral band looks like a lopsided oval that swings lower across Canada and higher across Scandinavia and Russia. 

This explains why Yellowknife (62° N) and Tromsø (70° N) can have similar corrected geomagnetic latitude of 67, while Whitehorse (61° N) and Oslo (60° N) have similar geographic latitude but very different geomagnetic latitudes. When geomagnetic activity is low, the northern lights are typically visible at about 67 degrees magnetic latitude. As the lights get more active the auroral band gets wider, so destinations that lie a few degrees on either side of 67 magnetic latitude are a good bet. With a magnetic latitude of 63, my home in Whitehorse lies at the southern edge of this zone. 

Your position under the oval matters less during active periods when the auroral band is wide. Geomagnetic latitude becomes more critical during quiet periods or during the solar minimum. If I want the greatest certainty of seeing the aurora during off-peak years, I position myself along geomagnetic latitude of 67 because, just as most of us live too far south of the aurora, it’s also possible to be too far north. The following table shows geographic and geomagnetic latitudes of some northern cities.

Having good geomagnetic latitude is key, but there are no guarantees. You might get stuck in the clouds anyway, so your odds are better if you pick a destination with a reasonably good chance of clear or broken skies. Cities with interior climates like Fairbanks, Dawson City and Kiruna offer more clear nights, but cloud-free skies come at a price: the cold. Warmer places along the Gulf Stream like Norway and Greenland offer comfortable conditions, but coastal climates get mixed weather. You might want to pick a temperate place like Iceland and stay longer, or you might prefer a short trip to a cold destination like Yellowknife.

Depending on your interests, you can also evaluate things like infrastructure. More isolated places like Yellowknife, Churchill and Nuuk mean you have fewer options for finding new compositions or driving out from under the clouds. Yukon, Iceland and northern Norway are well-connected by roads and you can explore in almost any direction. Light pollution is a problem in many places Norway, so you often have to make the most of a location despite the constraints.  

Even if you could choose to be anywhere, it’s not always obvious where you should go. Everyone’s interests and preferences are different, each place is unique, and all of the destinations I’ve visited have their merits. Perhaps, like me, you’ll get hooked and the chase will be on, and you’ll travel around the poles in search of special experiences and iconic landscapes under the aurora.