Countdown

December Solstice 2026

Name: December Solstice 2026
Start: 2026-12-21
Location: Global

Monday, December 21, 2026 · 46 days away

GlobalSpacescheduled

Countdown

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Reminders

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Event overview

December solstice at 20:50 UTC on Dec 21, 2026 — the shortest day in the Northern Hemisphere and longest in the Southern Hemisphere.

Date: 2026-12-21
Country / jurisdiction: Global
Region: Global
Category: Space
Status: scheduled

Confirmation checklist

Before you act on this countdown

Use the timer for orientation, then run through these checks before booking, publishing, buying tickets, scheduling alerts, or moving operations around this date.

Date signal

The date is suitable for countdown use, with the source still owning late changes.

Local time

No reliable start time is attached yet, so this page stays date-first instead of implying midnight.

Calendar action

Add it to a calendar after checking the source for time, venue, or access changes.

Next useful path

Use the Space and 2026 paths below to compare related countdowns before deciding what to watch next.

Source trail

Source trail for December Solstice 2026

Verify source

Primary source

aa.usno.navy.mil

Last reviewed

2026-04-30

Tracker status

scheduled

Date precision

Single-date event without a reliable public start time; date-first countdown only.

Schema posture

Event structured data is emitted because the record is single-date and scheduled or confirmed.

This is an expected date. Use reminders and monitoring, but verify the source before making travel, purchase, publication, or staffing decisions.

Primary citation

The current date signal points to aa.usno.navy.mil. The source URL is shown visibly on the page so readers can verify late changes instead of relying only on the timer.

Freshness and review

Source policy was reviewed on 2026-04-30. Live countdown values are render-time snapshots; editorial source fields update when the tracked event dataset changes.

Operational detail

The record does not carry a reliable public start time yet, so the page avoids implying a midnight or all-day start.

Weak-date handling

The page can support calendar actions and Event schema, while still telling readers to check the source for operational changes.

What this countdown tracks

The clock counts down to the December solstice of 2026, which occurs at 20:50 UTC on Monday, December 21, 2026. At that instant the Sun reaches its southernmost declination, the Northern Hemisphere has its shortest day of the year and the Southern Hemisphere its longest, and astronomical winter (Northern) and astronomical summer (Southern) begin.

About this celestial event

The 2026 December solstice falls on a Monday evening UTC, four days before Christmas. Local times for the 20:50 UTC instant: 15:50 in New York (EST), 20:50 in London (GMT), 21:50 in Paris and Berlin (CET), 23:50 in Moscow, 02:20 on December 22 in New Delhi, and 05:50 on December 22 in Tokyo. North America observes the solstice on December 21 local time; most of Eurasia observes it on December 21 in time zones west of Moscow and on December 22 east of it.

What's astronomically distinctive about 2026: the December solstice falls just two days before the December 23 supermoon — the closest full moon of 2026, with a perigee distance of approximately 357,400 km. The solstice night is therefore exceptionally bright, with the near-full Moon already 99% illuminated; northern-hemisphere observers will see the supermoon rise in the early evening of the solstice itself. The Geminid meteor shower peak (December 13-14) has long since faded, but the Ursid shower has its smaller peak on the night of the solstice itself — a 5-10 meteors-per-hour radiant near the bowl of Ursa Minor.

At Newgrange in Ireland the December sunrise of December 21, 2026 illuminates the inner chamber of the 5,000-year-old passage tomb at approximately 09:00 GMT — the live-streamed event run by Ireland's Office of Public Works.

What to expect

At London or Berlin December 21 runs only about eight hours of daylight; New York gets nine; Mumbai 11; everywhere north of the Arctic Circle is in 24-hour darkness. From the solstice onward the days lengthen again — slowly at first (about a minute a day at temperate latitudes) and then accelerating through January.

The classic observances: Newgrange's lottery-allocated chamber viewing (the Office of Public Works streams the alignment live); Stonehenge's evening solstice gathering at the December sunset (English Heritage opens the stones); Iran's Shab-e Yalda the longest-night vigil with pomegranates and Hafez poetry; the Inca Inti Raymi festival in Cusco (which celebrates the June solstice in the southern hemisphere, the southern-summer equivalent). Modern Christmas inherits its date from the late-Roman repurposing of the December solstice festival of Sol Invictus.

Past solstices

December 21, 2025 — solstice at 15:03 UTC
December 21, 2024 — solstice at 09:21 UTC
December 22, 2023 — solstice at 03:27 UTC
December 21, 2022 — solstice at 21:48 UTC
December 21, 2021 — solstice at 15:59 UTC
December 21, 2020 — solstice at 10:02 UTC (the rare "great conjunction" of Jupiter and Saturn at sunset)

How to observe

The US Naval Observatory, UK Met Office and timeanddate.com publish the exact instant. The Office of Public Works in Ireland streams the Newgrange chamber alignment from a fixed-position camera inside the passage tomb. English Heritage covers the Stonehenge sunset. Iranian state TV carries Shab-e Yalda live. The full supermoon of December 23 is best photographed at moonrise local time, ideally framed against the eastern horizon.

The December solstice anchors the year-end alongside March equinox 2026, June solstice 2026, and September equinox 2026. Pair with Supermoon December 2026 for the supermoon two days later, Geminid meteor shower 2026 for the December showers calendar, and Christmas 2026 for the holiday-season run-in.

FAQ

When is the December solstice 2026? Monday, December 21, 2026 at 20:50 UTC. Why is it the shortest day in the Northern Hemisphere? Because Earth's North Pole is tilted furthest from the Sun on this date. What's special about 2026? The solstice falls two days before the December 23 supermoon — the closest full moon of 2026. Can I see the Newgrange chamber alignment? Only by entering the public lottery; Ireland's Office of Public Works also live-streams the chamber camera from inside the passage tomb.

Date confidence

Scheduled date

December Solstice 2026 is tracked as a scheduled event. The date is suitable for countdown and calendar use, while final logistics should still be checked against the linked source.

Source

https://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/Earth_Seasons

Source host: aa.usno.navy.mil
Date precision: Single scheduled date from the linked source
Schema posture: Event startDate emitted because the record is single-date and scheduled/confirmed
Planning boundary: Use as a monitoring aid until the source trail is stronger

Structured data posture

This page emits Event structured data because the tracked record has a single scheduled or confirmed date. The linked source remains the final reference for time, venue, and operational changes.

Countdown evidence

Retention class

Date-first scheduled countdown

Evidence score

5/10 record signals

City-page readiness

Held to date-first

Evidence score5/10 signals present: primary source URL; tracked date; schema-safe date; place context; related event cluster
Date and schemaSchema-safe single date: Single-date event without a reliable public start time; date-first countdown only. Event structured data is emitted because the record is single-date and scheduled or confirmed.
Local-time readinessDate-first only: The record is not used as a city-local event page until it has a reliable time, timezone, and non-windowed date.
Record completeness1 concrete fields: country Global
Weak-field watchlist4 fields to improve: verified public start time; venue; manual official-source note; historical sequence
Source freshnessaa.usno.navy.mil; reviewed 2026-04-30: Related crawl path: Shrek 5 (Theatrical), Avengers: Doomsday (Theatrical), Dune: Messiah (Theatrical), Ice Age 6: Boiling Point — Theatrical Release.

Planning notes

How to use this December Solstice 2026 countdown

Countdown pages are useful when they are honest about what is known, what is merely expected, and what still needs checking. This page keeps the live timer separate from the source confidence and structured-data posture.

Date confidence

December Solstice 2026 is tracked as scheduled for Monday, December 21, 2026; the countdown can support reminders while final logistics still belong to aa.usno.navy.mil. The page can emit precise Event structured data because the tracked record has a single scheduled or confirmed date.

What could change

Watch for date shifts, venue or access updates, broadcast windows, registration rules, and source corrections. The current precision is: Single-date event without a reliable public start time; date-first countdown only..

Local-time usefulness

No reliable source start time is attached yet, so the page stays date-first and avoids implying a midnight start. 46 days remain at render time.

Category context

December Solstice 2026 sits in Space with Global context. Related countdown links should help users compare similar events, not create unverified event-city pages.

Catalog-specific details

No creator, platform, league, brand, fixture, family, or alternate-name detail is attached to this event record.

Series and expectation notes

No series history, end date, or what-to-expect field is attached.

Priority note

This page is kept specific through source confidence, category, region, date precision, and update notes rather than generic countdown filler.

Verification trail

source URL https://aa.usno.navy.mil/data/Earth_Seasons. trust checks: Source host: aa.usno.navy.mil, Date precision: Single scheduled date from the linked source, Schema posture: Event startDate emitted because the record is single-date and scheduled/confirmed, and Planning boundary: Use as a monitoring aid until the source trail is stronger. no manual editorial context is attached yet.

Record completeness

present fields: country Global. missing or weak fields: verified public start time, venue, manual official-source note, and historical sequence

Related crawl path

Nearby retained events: Shrek 5 (Theatrical), Avengers: Doomsday (Theatrical), Dune: Messiah (Theatrical), Ice Age 6: Boiling Point — Theatrical Release, and Avengers: Doomsday. These links should support topical discovery without creating unverified event-city pages.

Review boundary: this page tracks the public date signal, source link, category, region, and calendar posture. It does not replace official ticketing, exchange, broadcaster, organizer, court, regulator, or government notices.

Source reviewed Apr 30, 2026. The countdown record is intentionally labeled as scheduled or expected; use the source link and any range notes before treating the date as final.

Live values rendered at Nov 5, 7:05 PM UTC.

Related planning pages

Countdown hubAll currently tracked countdowns.Space countdownsRelated events in this category.2026 countdownsEvents tracked for the same calendar year.SourcesHow we cite and review date sources.Speculative datesHow expected and windowed dates are labeled.

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