🌅 Sunrise Sunset Calculator

How sunrise and sunset are calculated

Sunrise and sunset happen when the sun’s center crosses the horizon. This depends on your latitude, the sun’s declination (its north-south position for that day of the year), and your longitude and time zone, which shift the calculated solar time to match your local clock.

How this calculator works

The calculator first finds the sun’s declination for the given day of year, then uses your latitude to solve for the hour angle at which the sun sits exactly on the horizon. That hour angle gives both the length of daylight and the times of sunrise and sunset in local solar time. A correction (the “equation of time”) accounts for Earth’s elliptical orbit and axial tilt, and your longitude and time zone offset are used to convert that solar time into an approximate local clock time.

This is a standard astronomical approximation for general planning purposes. It does not account for atmospheric refraction (which shifts the visible sunrise/sunset by a few minutes), elevation, or daylight saving time adjustments, so treat results as close estimates rather than official almanac times. Times are shown as 24-hour decimal hours (for example, 6.50 means 6:30 AM and 18.25 means 6:15 PM).