Wednesday 12 August 2026 · Greenland · Iceland · Spain
The first total solar eclipse over mainland Europe since 1999.
For about two minutes the Moon will cover the Sun completely along a band roughly 290 km wide, running from the Arctic across Iceland and down into northern Spain — where it happens with the Sun almost on the horizon, minutes before sunset. Everywhere else in Europe, north Africa and eastern North America gets a partial eclipse.
The eclipse is over.
You can still replay the whole thing minute by minute in the simulator.
The numbers
Where and when
The Moon's shadow touches the Earth at 16:58:04 UTC and leaves at 18:34:00 UTC. Somewhere on Earth a partial eclipse is under way from 15:35:05 to 19:57:14 UTC.
The track is unusual in that it runs backwards across the map compared with most eclipses — from the Arctic south-west then south-east — and it ends with the Sun setting. That last detail shapes everything about watching it from Spain: the Sun is between about 12° and 2° above the horizon during totality, so you need an unobstructed view towards the west-north-west, and hills, buildings or a bank of coastal cloud will simply take the event away from you.
-
The shadow lands in the Arctic
The umbra first touches the Earth in the Arctic Ocean north of Siberia, with the Sun right on the horizon. It then races west and south across the pole.
-
Across eastern Greenland
The shadow sweeps over the ice sheet and the uninhabited east coast, where the Sun is high enough for a long, dark totality but almost nobody is watching.
-
Greatest eclipse, just off Iceland
The deepest point of the eclipse falls in the sea west of Iceland, with totality lasting 138 seconds and the Sun 25.8° up. Western Iceland is the only easily reachable land with the Sun still comfortably above the horizon.
-
Out over the North Atlantic
For half an hour the umbra crosses open ocean, sinking towards the horizon as it goes and losing height on the sky with every minute.
-
Landfall in northern Spain
The shadow reaches Galicia and Asturias and crosses the whole peninsula in about six minutes. By now the Sun is only 9° above the horizon, so a clear, low western view matters as much as clear sky overhead.
-
Out over the Balearics and gone
Totality ends over the western Mediterranean with the Sun on the point of setting. For anyone on Mallorca or Ibiza the eclipsed Sun sets almost immediately afterwards.
-
The umbra leaves the Earth
Ninety-six minutes after it arrived, the shadow slides off the globe near the coast of North Africa and the eclipse is over.
What this site does
Computes, rather than copies
Every time, duration and angle here is worked out in your browser from the Besselian elements NASA publishes for this eclipse. Pick any point on Earth and it will solve for the four contact times, the depth of the eclipse and the Sun's position in your sky.
Shows what you will actually see
The simulator places the Moon on the Sun using that same geometry, at the right size ratio and turned the right way up for your horizon — including the low, reddened Sun that makes the Spanish view so distinctive.
Is honest about the edges
Bilbao gets about half a minute of totality; Madrid, a few kilometres further south, gets none. The site says so, and warns you when your position is close enough to a limit that the Moon's ragged edge makes the answer uncertain.
Works out the weather odds
Where to watch pairs each city's circumstances with its August cloud climatology, so you can weigh a longer totality against a better chance of actually seeing it. It is not a forecast — check one of those too.