Aurora alerts for your location
An alert that says "Kp 5!" at noon is noise. The alert being built here is the verdict page sent to you at the right moment: a note in the afternoon when the three-day forecast puts tonight's Kp at your latitude's threshold, and a message when the oval actually brightens over your northern horizon during your dark hours — with the same four numbers the page shows, so you can judge it yourself. It is not live yet. This page says what it will do, what it will not, and what you can do tonight without it.
What an alert will say
- Daily note
- sent about 16:00 in your zone, only on days the forecast reaches your threshold minus one; skipped otherwise
- Storm alert
- sent when NOAA's grid shows the oval within reach of your pin while it is dark, at most once every six hours
- Each message
- the word, the oval's chance and elevation, Kp, cloud, Moon, and the window — the verdict card in text
- Unsubscribe
- one click in every message, no account, no password
What it will not do
- Track you
- the pin is stored rounded to a quarter of a degree (about 25 km), which is all the oval geometry needs
- Sell the list
- the address is used for these messages and deleted 30 days after you unsubscribe, or after a year without a message being opened
- Promise a display
- every alert carries its numbers; the aurora is a probability and the message says so
- Cost money
- the first location is free; nothing is decided beyond that
Tonight, without an alert
Open northern lights tonight and set your pin; the address bar keeps it, so a bookmark reopens your own verdict. The page refreshes itself every five minutes while it is open, and every minute during a storm. For a trip, the 27-day strip on the forecast page marks the nights whose outlook reaches your threshold. NOAA's own free notification service, which sends every warning and alert for the whole planet, is at swpc.noaa.gov.