Northern Lights in MaineVisible Tonight?
Real-time aurora forecast updated every 15 minutes
Kp 2.0 is well below the Kp 6 that Maine needs, so the aurora stays too far north tonight.
Verify with the live sky camera →No clear chance in the next 10 nights; forecasts update several times a day, so check back.
Tonight, Hour by Hour
The four things that must line up over Maine, and how each hour of the night looks.
Kp 2.0 now, Kp 6 needed here
30% cloud cover around 9 PM
Dark from 10 PM
Dark rural skies; moon 8% lit
All times shown in Maine local time (EDT), not your device time.
10-Night Aurora Outlook
Planning a trip to Maine? Peak activity, cloud cover, and darkness for the nights ahead.
Kp ~ marks nights beyond NOAA's precise 3-day forecast, estimated from the 27-day outlook. Treat the far nights as a rough guide, not a promise.
Seeing the aurora in Maine
The northern lights in Maine are a real prospect if you head north: Aroostook County and the Katahdin region sit far enough up that a strong storm brings the aurora into view. Northern Maine has some of the darkest and most northerly skies in the Northeast, including Katahdin Woods and Waters, a certified International Dark Sky Sanctuary, and at Kp 6 the glow can climb over the open horizon.
Our verdict is not a Kp number. The Kp index is a global, three-hour average, and treating it as a promise is the single biggest reason people drive out and see nothing. Instead we check four things for Maine specifically: whether forecast activity reaches the level this latitude needs, whether the sky will be clear, whether it will actually be dark, and how much moonlight and local light pollution will wash out. Only when all four line up do we say yes.
When to go: aurora season in Maine
Aurora season in Maine runs from late August through mid-April. The limiting factor in summer is not the sun but the sky: in June and July, northern Maine never gets fully dark enough for long enough to catch a display. The strongest odds cluster around the equinoxes, September, October, and March, when Earth's magnetic field couples more efficiently with the solar wind and the same storm produces a bigger show.
Through the current solar maximum, Aroostook County has been getting photographable aurora on a handful of nights in a typical month, with a few storms each year reaching naked-eye strength this far south. Those big nights are what the 10-night outlook above is for: when a Kp 6 or 7 storm is on the way, it usually shows up two or three days ahead.
Why northern Maine wins: Aroostook and the Katahdin dark skies
Northern Maine wins on two counts: latitude and darkness. Aroostook County sits near 46 to 47 degrees north, about as far up as the lower 48 reaches, and it is one of the least light-polluted corners of the eastern United States. Katahdin Woods and Waters National Monument is a certified International Dark Sky Sanctuary, the first in New England, and the open farmland and wildland of The County give you the dark, flat northern horizon the aurora needs.
That combination is why the best Maine aurora photos come from the north, not the coast. Drive into Aroostook or the Katahdin region, put the open horizon in front of you, and a modest storm that reads as camera-only glow in southern Maine can show visible color. The tradeoff is distance: these spots are hours from Portland, so the north rewards people who plan the trip around a good forecast.
How to read tonight's forecast like a local
From northern Maine you generally need Kp 6 for a naked-eye display and about Kp 5 for your camera to catch it; from the southern coast the bar rises to Kp 7 or more. The Kp number is only the entry ticket, though: a clear north horizon and real darkness matter just as much, which is why the verdict above folds cloud cover and twilight into a single answer instead of leaving you to juggle three apps.
On a promising night, get out early, give it at least two hours, and let your eyes dark-adapt for 15 minutes without checking your phone. Aurora arrives in substorms: bursts of 15 to 40 minutes with quiet gaps between them. Point night mode at the northern horizon now and then, because the camera will pick up an approaching display before your eyes do.