Total solar eclipse, 2 August 2027

Totality on 2 August 2027 lasts about 6 minutes 22 seconds at its longest, in the desert just south-east of Luxor. That is nearly two minutes longer than the eclipse that crossed North America in April 2024, and it is the longest totality anyone standing on land will see for the rest of this century and most of the next: the next longer one over land does not arrive until 2114.

It is worth being precise about that claim, because it is usually made too strongly. This is not the longest total eclipse of the 21st century. The eclipse of 22 July 2009 ran to 6 minutes 39 seconds and remains the longest of the century. What 2027 has is the longest totality that falls where people can reasonably stand under it, which is a different and rarer thing.

That is the second reason it matters. Long eclipses are not unusual; long eclipses over land are. The Moon's shadow spends most of its time crossing ocean, and the deep-totality middle of a track normally goes with it. This one puts its middle over the Nile valley. The path is up to 258 kilometres wide, and about 89 million people already live inside it, without travelling anywhere.

The geometry behind it is straightforward enough. Earth is still close to aphelion in early August, so the Sun is near its smallest for the year, and the Moon is close enough to perigee to cover it with room to spare: the eclipse magnitude is 1.079, meaning the Moon's disc is about eight per cent wider than the Sun's. The track also runs near the equator, where the surface is turning fastest in the direction the shadow is travelling and so stays inside it longest. All three line up at once, which is why the number is what it is.

Spain is where the shadow first reaches Europe, and it only just does. The path clips the southern coast of Andalusia and its northern edge runs close enough to the coast that a short drive changes the answer: Gibraltar, on the Strait, gets 4 minutes 28 seconds, Cádiz gets 2 minutes 56 seconds, and Málaga, further along the coast and nearer the edge, gets 1 minute 57 seconds. Anywhere north of that line sees only a partial eclipse, however deep.

Totality falls in the middle of the morning, around 10:45 local time, with the Sun already high. That is the easiest circumstance on the whole track for anyone who does not want to travel far.

This is also the middle eclipse of three. A total eclipse crossed northern Spain on 12 August 2026, the first over the Spanish mainland since 1905; this one crosses the south in 2027; and an annular eclipse follows on 26 January 2028. Spain's national geographic institute publishes guidance for all three as one sequence, and ESA has been treating them the same way.

Egypt is where this eclipse is decided. The centre line runs the length of the Nile valley and passes almost directly over Luxor, and the point of greatest eclipse falls in the desert a short distance to its south-east. Luxor itself gets 6 minutes 22 seconds of totality beginning at 13:02 local time.

The Sun stands about 82 degrees above the horizon at that moment, which is very close to straight overhead. It removes the one problem that spoils most eclipses: nothing on the ground can get in the way, and the corona is seen through the least atmosphere it can be seen through.

The other thing Egypt has is early August in Upper Egypt, which is about as reliable a sky as this planet offers. That combination, six minutes of totality, a Sun near the zenith, a sky that is dependably clear, and the Valley of the Kings underneath it, is why tour operators began selling this eclipse years in advance.

The path crosses northern Morocco immediately after Spain, taking in Tangier, Tétouan and Chefchaouen. Tangier sees 4 minutes 51 seconds, appreciably more than Cádiz across the water, because the centre line runs closer to it.

Watch the clock rather than the guidebook here. Morocco spent seven years on UTC+1 year round, and repealed it in June 2026: since 20 September 2026 the country has been on GMT permanently, with no summer change and no Ramadan change. Totality at Tangier therefore begins at 08:44 local time, not 09:44. Most eclipse guides still say the latter, and some will still say it next August.

Totality is early in the morning and the Sun is correspondingly lower than it is further east, which makes the horizon matter. It also makes the approaching shadow easier to see coming, which is the compensation.

The shadow crosses the Red Sea and comes ashore on the Hejaz coast in the early afternoon. Jeddah gets 5 minutes 55 seconds beginning at 13:22 local time, which makes it one of the largest cities anywhere on the track, and one of the few of any size to see close to six minutes of totality.

The path also passes over Mecca, which sees 5 minutes 14 seconds of totality just after 13:26 local time. A total eclipse over the city is a rare enough event to account for a good deal of the regional interest in this date, and it will shape how crowded the Saudi side of the path is.

By this point the shadow is past greatest eclipse and beginning to shorten, but only slightly: the difference between Luxor and Jeddah is under half a minute. Saudi Arabia is the last place on the track where totality is measured in nearly six minutes rather than five or fewer.