Witness majestic auroras with our Northern Lights Tours in Iceland

Join us on a journey into the cold Icelandic winter nights in search of a natural phenomenon, the Northern Lights. The Northern Lights or aurora borealis are as elusive as they are magnificent. 

They have captured the imagination of people throughout our history and a great number of folktales and mythology have sprung up around them.Human kind has always created fantastical tales to explain what they do not comprehend. But the science behind the aurora is just as fascinating. These ethereal lights form when solar winds agitate the Earth’s magnetic field, ionizing particles and causing them to emit light that we see as wispy bands of color across the sky at night. Auroras can form in a variety of colors depending on the altitude of the ionizing particles, but they most commonly appear as green in color.

Our expert tour guides combine years of experience and insight, consult the aurora forecast of the Icelandic Met Office in order to find the most likely location for a great show on any given night. But don´t worry if your don´t catch the lights, because all our northern lights tours come with our Unlimited Free Retry Tours Guarantee.

BusTravel Iceland offers a range of tours in English, including small group tours, photography tours and our great value and highly recommended classic bus tour. With over 31,000 5 star reviews, you can be sure you are joining one of the best northern lights tour Iceland has to offer.

Popular Northern Lights Tours

Explore our most popular aurora tours

Sightseeing & Northern Lights tours

These tours combine sightseeing and activities with Northern Lights Hunting.

How do we find the Northern Lights in Iceland for you?

When we call these tours a Northern Lights “hunt,” we mean it. The Northern Lights can be difficult to locate and do not always appear in the same locations on a daily basis. Luckily we have a team of northern lights specialists who study atmospheric data, cloud coverage forecast and the weather throughout the day! Their knowledge and experience mixed with our fantastic guides, and a little luck, allows us to get you to where the lights are likely to be and hopefully give you a unique spectacle. See our great blog post on to learn about the kP-index and more of the science behind the magic.

For those nights when luck unfortunately doesn’t smile on us, we’re offer you a chance to reschedule and join us again on another aurora hunt, free of charge! We are determined to make sure you see these auroras.

Where is the best place in Iceland to see the Northern Lights?

The destination for our tours is not fixed since the aurora can be so unpredictable, but we will head to a location where we think a sighting is most likely. We can head along the south coast or towards the golden circle, but in general we try to keep our travel times as short as possible so that you get the maximum amount of time with this phenomenon. This means that the perfect location is within a 1 hour radius of Reykjavík.

What are the Northern Lights and what causes them?

The aurora borealis can be seen in many Northern hemisphere countries, especially those that border the Arctic circle. The collision of electrically charged solar particles entering the atmosphere causes the lights to be spotted in the northern hemisphere, although there are also southern lights in the southern hemisphere.

The Aurora Borealis appears in all kinds of bright colors. Green (or a pale green/yellow) is the most common color, however, those lucky enough to be in Iceland at the right time of year will also see pink, red, blue and even orange lights. There are many factors that contribute to the color of lights, and you never really know what color you might see. Depending on the type of gas particles colliding in the atmosphere, the lights take on these different colors. The common green color is caused by oxygen above the earth while the very rare red lights are caused by oxygen found at a much higher altitude. When blue or purple lights are observed, it is due to the presence of nitrogen.

Around 1880 the connection between lights and solar activity was discovered although before that it had been suspected. Research in the 1950s conclusively proved that electrons and protons from the sun were blown by solar winds toward the earth and that once they entered the atmosphere, the sky could light up. The colliding particles are what seem to make the lights dance. The lights can wander and rise from 80 kilometers to about 640 kilometers above the earth.

What are the best place in the world to see the Northern Lights?

The debate over the best place to see the Northern Lights is often discussed. Norway, Finland and Alaska are popular countries along with Iceland, although there have been rare times when the lights have been spotted as far south as New Orleans in the United States. The lights take the shape of an irregular oval, usually centered on each of the magnetic poles, both north and south.

Iceland is the perfect place to take full advantage of the display and every year, tourists from all over the world flock to Iceland to take part in one of these tours. If you lean towards the Icelandic tour (and you certainly won’t regret your choice), you will find that there are certain conditions that allow for favorable sightings. Firstly, the tour you choose should take you away from the bright lights of any built-up urban areas, and then you’ll also need to consider the time of year you’re visiting. 

Whether you choose our photography tour or small group northern lights tour Iceland is a great option for Aurora fanatics!

What is the best time of year to the Northern Lights in Iceland?

September to April are good months to visit, with November to February considered the best window. During the winter months, the days are shorter and the nights longer, giving you even more chance to see the lights.

It is almost impossible to see the northern lights from May to late August, as Iceland experiences the midnight sun, with the sun merely peaking briefly below the horizon in high summer.