Sunrise & sunset times in Canberra

Sun and moon in Canberra

Stargazers, dog walkers and commuters rely on the daily sun and moon schedule for Canberra, Australia. This page shows live sunrise, sunset, solar noon, day length, morning and evening golden hour, blue hour, dawn and dusk, plus the current moon phase and the moonrise and moonset times for Canberra. Every value is calculated in the browser for the date you pick and shown in the local time of Canberra, Australia. Canberra sits at roughly 35.28 degrees south, in the southern hemisphere, so it sees a clear but moderate seasonal swing, with noticeably longer days in summer and cosier, earlier sunsets in winter. Because the length of the day changes with the seasons, the exact sunrise and sunset in Canberra shift from week to week. Pick any date with the date picker to see how the light will fall on a specific day, which is handy for planning a shoot, an event, a wedding, a flight or simply the best moment to catch the last warm light of the evening. Golden hour, that soft warm window near sunrise and sunset, is the favourite of photographers in Canberra. Blue hour, the cooler stretch just before sunrise and just after sunset, is ideal for cityscapes and long exposures. Combined with the moon phase and moon times, this gives you a complete picture of natural light over Canberra, Australia for any day of the year.

What time is sunset in Canberra today?

The sun sets in Canberra at 18:07 today, Friday, 2 October 2026, in Canberra's own local time. The warm light starts well before that: evening golden hour opens at 17:33, giving 34 minutes of low golden light before the sun reaches the horizon. Sunset is not the end of the light either. Last light, the moment usable daylight ends at civil dusk, follows 26 minutes later at 18:32, and the sky is properly dark at 19:33, 1h 26m after sunset.

Tomorrow the sun sets at 18:08 in Canberra. That is 47 seconds later than today.

Planning around the light? See golden hour in Canberra.

Is the day getting longer or shorter in Canberra right now?

Canberra gets 12h 28m of daylight today, from sunrise to sunset. Tomorrow will be 2 minutes 13 seconds longer. Over the next seven days Canberra gains 15 minutes 26 seconds of daylight.

That pace is not constant. In Canberra the day length changes fastest around March, near the equinox, when it moves by about 2 minutes 15 seconds per day, and it slows almost to a stop at the solstices in June and December. The word solstice means exactly that: the sun standing still.

When are the earliest and latest sunrise and sunset in Canberra?

The earliest sunset of 2026 in Canberra falls on 12 June at 16:57, 9 days before the June solstice, and the latest on 6 January at 20:21.

Sunrise runs on its own schedule: earliest on 3 October at 05:37, latest on 4 April at 07:18, the last morning before the clocks go back. Two of these dates are pinned by the clocks rather than by the sky: a daylight saving change in Canberra moves sunrise and sunset by a whole hour overnight, so the earliest and latest times on the clock land on either side of it. The rest is astronomy. Earth's orbit is slightly elliptical and its axis is tilted, so the sun runs a few minutes fast or slow against clock time through the year. That offset, the equation of time, is what pushes the earliest sunset ahead of the shortest day and the latest sunrise behind it.

These are wall-clock times, so Canberra's daylight saving change is part of the picture: an hour moved by the clocks counts the same as an hour moved by the Earth.

For the longest and shortest day themselves, see day length in Canberra.

How long does twilight last in Canberra?

First light in Canberra arrives 25 minutes before sunrise today, at 05:13. After sunset the light hangs on for another 26 minutes, until 18:32. That evening stretch is not the same all year in Canberra: it runs from 25 minutes at its shortest, in March, to 30 minutes at its longest, in December. The lower the angle at which the sun crosses the horizon, the longer twilight lasts, which is why dusk is a slow affair at high latitudes and abrupt near the equator.

Full three-band twilight tables: dawn in Canberra and dusk in Canberra.

How high does the sun get in Canberra?

At midday on the December solstice the sun stands 78.2 degrees above the horizon in Canberra. On the June solstice it climbs only 31.3 degrees. A midday sun that low throws a shadow about 1.6 times the height of whatever casts it, so even at noon in midwinter the shadows in Canberra are long ones.

Frequently asked questions about Canberra

Data and methodology: every time on this page is computed from Canberra's coordinates with SunCalc, an open source astronomy library, not estimated or looked up from a table. Coordinates -35.28, 149.13, time zone Australia/Sydney. Accurate to about a minute for a flat, unobstructed horizon; terrain, tall buildings and atmospheric conditions can shift the moment the sun is actually visible by a few minutes. Full method on methodology.

Nearby cities

Sun and moon times for places close to Canberra. Sunrise and sunset shift as you move east, west, north or south.

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Understand the light

Plain-English guides to the moments that shape the day in Canberra and everywhere else.

Keep Canberra in your calendar

Subscribe to a live feed of Canberra's sunrise and sunset in your own calendar app, so today's light is always a glance away. It updates by itself, with no account.