Stargazing by month
Where to Go Stargazing in November
November is when the aurora season really opens up. Darkness now runs close to twelve hours across the top picks: Northern Lights in Tromsø and Abisko both log 11.9 hours, with Fairbanks close behind at 11.7. Finnish Lapland, Iceland, and Yellowknife round out the list at 11.7-11.8 hours; every one of these is a legitimate aurora trip this month, it's mostly a question of how much polar night you want.
The Milky Way parks are shifting too, gearing up for their own long-night stretch. Stargazing in Jasper National Park leads with 11.3 hours of dark sky, its best month of the whole aurora season window. Death Valley, Merzouga, Wadi Rum, Big Bend, and AlUla all sit at 10.5-10.8 hours, with Bryce Canyon and Joshua Tree not far behind. If you want both a shot at the galactic core's last visible traces and genuinely long nights, November rewards a US or North African desert trip more than most other months.
The Leonids in November
The Leonids peak around November 17 each year, a moderate shower with a ZHR around 15, better known for producing occasional outburst years than reliable annual counts. Outburst years are rare and hard to predict far in advance, so plan for a normal night's rate unless closer forecasts say otherwise. Moon phase varies by year too: check where the new moon falls relative to the 17th before you go. In years when it's a young crescent that sets well before midnight, the back half of the night stays properly dark for meteor watching; in other years a brighter moon will cut into that. Visible from both hemispheres, though as with the aurora and Milky Way picks this month, the destinations built around it lean heavily northern.
Notably absent this month: the southern hemisphere desert parks that own the Milky Way from April through September. Uluru, the Atacama, NamibRand, and Aoraki Mackenzie don't make November's top picks at all, this is their off season, and a Milky Way trip built around any of them right now would fight both weather and short dark windows. If the southern hemisphere is on your list, wait for their own season rather than trying to force it into a November itinerary built for the north.
Pair a Leonids night with an aurora trip if your dates line up. A clear November sky at any of the top aurora destinations gives you a real shot at both in the same evening, without changing your itinerary at all.
November also tends to be a genuine value month for aurora trips: shoulder-season pricing before the December surge, while darkness and odds are already close to their peak. Our Northern Lights Season 2026-27 guide breaks down how each month compares if you're still deciding when to book.
Where to go this month
Best for the aurora in November
- Northern Lights in Tromsø Bortle 3 · 11.9 h dark
- Abisko Stargazing Bortle 1–2 · 11.9 h dark
- Fairbanks Northern Lights Bortle 4 · 11.7 h dark
- Northern Lights in Finnish Lapland Bortle 1–5 · 11.8 h dark
- Northern Lights in Iceland Bortle 2–5 · 11.7 h dark
- Yellowknife Northern Lights Bortle 1–5 · 11.7 h dark
Best for the Milky Way in November
- Stargazing in Jasper National Park Bortle 3–5 · 11.3 h dark
- Death Valley Bortle 1–2 · 10.8 h dark
- Merzouga Stargazing Bortle 1–2 · 10.7 h dark
- Wadi Rum Bortle 2–3 · 10.6 h dark
- Big Bend National Park Bortle 1 · 10.6 h dark
- AlUla Stargazing Bortle 1–2 · 10.5 h dark
November sky facts
- New moons (darkest nights)
- November 9, 2026 · November 27, 2027
- Aurora
- In season at high latitudes · aurora season →
- Meteor showers peaking
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- Leonids · peaks November 17
- Darkness this month (mid-month)
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- Northern Lights in Tromsø 11.9 h dark
- Abisko Stargazing 11.9 h dark
- Big Bend National Park 10.6 h dark
- AlUla Stargazing 10.5 h dark