How to see the aurora australis

A natural light display caused by charged particles from the sun colliding with gases in Earth's upper atmosphere. The collisions release energy as glowing light, usually green, pink or red, typically 100 to 300km up.

The aurora australis, the southern lights, is the aurora that appears near the South Pole, over Antarctica and the far south of Australia and New Zealand. It's the exact same phenomenon as the aurora borealis in the north, just the southern-hemisphere counterpart.

Solar wind, charged particles constantly streaming from the sun, gets funnelled toward the poles by Earth's magnetic field. When it hits oxygen and nitrogen in the upper atmosphere, it excites those gases, which release the light we see as aurora. Strong solar storms push more particles in, which is why storm nights are when the aurora reaches furthest from the poles, sometimes as far as Tasmania or Victoria.

Only which hemisphere they're in. Aurora australis is the southern lights, aurora borealis is the northern lights. They're driven by the same solar activity and happen at the same time, mirrored on each side of the planet.

Anywhere with a dark, south-facing horizon, during a strong enough geomagnetic storm. Tasmania has the best and most frequent chance in Australia, followed by Victoria, South Australia and southern WA, with New Zealand's South Island (especially Stewart Island) matching Tasmania. Check the region pages above for named viewing spots.

Face a dark, south-facing horizon, ideally between 10pm and 2am, and check tonight's live verdict for your location so you're not heading out on a quiet night. See the sections above for the full breakdown.

No, but it's a common mix-up. New Zealand only ever sees the aurora australis, the southern lights, driven by the same solar activity as the northern lights but appearing over the South Pole instead. If you're searching for the northern lights in NZ, what you actually want is a southern lights forecast for the South Island, especially Dunedin, the Catlins, and Stewart Island, which rival Tasmania for consistency.

Check tonight's live verdict on the homepage. It's a straight Go/No-Go call built from real-time Kaus, Bz, cloud cover and darkness for your location, updated every 5 minutes.

It depends on your location's darkness window and how active conditions are. Tonight's verdict card shows the exact dark-sky window for your region, and activity is statistically strongest around local magnetic midnight, roughly 10pm to 2am.

There's no fixed schedule, aurora depends on unpredictable solar activity, though advance CME warnings can give 48 to 72 hours' notice once a storm is confirmed heading toward Earth. Turn on free storm alerts and we'll notify you the moment conditions turn favourable.

Rarely. Sydney sits far enough north that only the strongest storms push the aurora oval that far. Tasmania, Victoria and southern WA are much better bets on an average storm night. If you're determined to try from Sydney, a dark, south-facing spot like Royal National Park is your best shot, and only during a major storm alert.

Any time it's fully dark, but activity is statistically strongest around local magnetic midnight, roughly 10pm to 2am, when your location rotates into the part of Earth's magnetic field most disturbed by the solar wind. Check tonight's verdict card for your location's exact dark-sky window.

Use Night Mode (iPhone) or Night/Pro mode (Android) and let it run its longest exposure. Rest the phone on something solid so it doesn't blur, turn off the flash, and tap the farthest point in frame to focus before the shutter starts. See our photography guide for the full walkthrough.

As a rough guide: Tasmania can pick up faint displays from around Kp 5, Victoria and South Australia usually need Kp 6 to 7, and the mainland further north needs an extreme Kp 8 or 9 storm. We track the Kaus index alongside Kp, a scale tuned for southern-hemisphere visibility that often gives an earlier read on your actual chances than Kp alone.