Golden Hour Timing Calculator

Work out golden hour timing instantly with clear inputs, formula shown and shareable results.

About Golden Hour Timing Calculator

Golden hour lasts while the sun sits between about six degrees above and the horizon, and because the sun's path is shallower at high latitude the window scales roughly with one over the cosine of latitude. At the equator golden hour is barely half an hour while at 60 degrees it stretches past an hour, which changes how much shooting time a location actually offers.

Formulas

Window length

golden hour minutes is about 30 / cos(latitude)

Timing

golden hour starts that many minutes before sunset; blue hour ends about two thirds of that after

Worked example

With the default values below, Golden Hour Timing Calculator returns Length of the golden hour of 42.4. Change any input above and every figure here is recalculated in your browser.

Inputs used

Sunset time as a decimal houraccepts 0–24: 19.5
Latitudeaccepts -75–75 deg: 45 deg

Results

Length of the golden hour: 42.4 min
Golden hour starts at: 18:48
Blue hour ends at: 19:58
Length of the blue hour: 28.3 min

Step by step

1Values used
2Window length
3Timing
4Length of the golden hour= 42.4 min
5Golden hour starts at= 18:48
6Blue hour ends at= 19:58
7Length of the blue hour= 28.3 min

Assumptions and limits

The result is derived only from the 2 inputs listed above. Anything not among them is not part of the calculation.
In particular, this calculator does not take inflation, tax, fees or charges or compounding frequency into account.
Figures are rounded for display to 1 decimal place, so totals built from several rounded parts can differ slightly from the unrounded arithmetic.

How these calculators are built and tested is described on the Methodology page. If a figure looks wrong, please report it.

Frequently Asked Questions

How is the Golden Hour Timing figure worked out?

golden hour minutes is about 30 / cos(latitude). Golden hour lasts while the sun sits between about six degrees above and the horizon, and because the sun's path is shallower at high latitude the window scales roughly with one over the cosine of latitude.

Why does this matter?

At the equator golden hour is barely half an hour while at 60 degrees it stretches past an hour, which changes how much shooting time a location actually offers.

What do I need to enter?

Enter sunset time as a decimal hour, latitude. The defaults shown are a realistic worked example — swap in your own figures to get a result you can use.