If you felt left out of the fun during Monday’s total solar eclipse, there will be other chances in the coming years to experience daytime temporarily turning to night as the Earth, the moon and the sun align.
The next total solar eclipse will occur on Aug. 12, 2026, but it will mostly pass over the Arctic Ocean. Totality, when the moon fully obscures the sun’s light, will be visible along a path that cuts through Russia, eastern Greenland, the western coast of Iceland, Spain and a tiny part of Portugal.
Then on Aug. 2, 2027, a total solar eclipse will be visible in Spain and across a swath of northern Africa.
After that, the next total solar eclipse will occur on March 30, 2033, but totality will be visible only from Alaska and Russia.
On Aug. 23, 2044, an eclipse’s path of totality will pass over some of the U.S.: Montana, North Dakota, South Dakota, parts of Canada and Greenland.
Then, finally, on Aug. 12, 2045, a total solar eclipse will once again trace a path from coast to coast across the continental U.S., similar to the one this year.
The path of totality for the 2045 eclipse will cut through California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Texas, Arkansas, Missouri, Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia and Florida before it continues on over the Caribbean and parts of South America.
During a total solar eclipse, the moon covers the face of the sun, temporarily masking its light and casting the moon’s shadow on Earth’s surface. People can see the moon fully block the sun from locations in the center of that shadow.
