Overview
- NASA has mapped a narrow path of totality for the eclipse on August 12, 2026 and says it will cross parts of Iceland, Greenland, northern Russia, the North Atlantic, parts of Spain and a small section of Portugal.
- Observers inside that narrow path will experience full darkness for a very short time, with most locations getting less than two minutes of totality and centreline sites seeing up to about two and a half minutes.
- The eclipse’s timing is highly location dependent, occurring around midday in northwest Russia, in the late afternoon or evening in Iceland and Greenland, and shortly before sunset in Spain and northwestern Portugal.
- A broad partial eclipse will be visible across much of the Northern Hemisphere, including parts of the northern United States, most of Canada, large areas of Europe and northwestern Africa, while the event will be invisible from the Indian subcontinent because the Sun is below the horizon there.
- Officials stress safety: it is unsafe to look at the Sun except during the brief complete totality, and viewers must use certified solar-viewing glasses or approved solar filters for every partial phase; skywatchers should also note a separate, longer total eclipse is expected in 2027.