Plan the light with the sun panel

The sun tool draws the sun's path over the live picture and opens a panel with sunrise, solar noon, sunset and the golden and blue hour windows for any day. Scrub the time to see where the sun will be at call time.

The sun's position is worked out on the device from the date, the time and where you stand, so it works with no signal.

1. Tap Sun among the tools at the top of the viewfinder and turn on Sun tracking. The path, the sun's disc and the sunrise and sunset marks are drawn over the picture.
2. Under Today, read sunrise, noon and sunset, and the golden and blue hour chips for the morning and the evening, with how long each lasts.
3. Under When, pick another day, or slide the time of day to move the sun along its path. LIVE means the panel follows the clock; tap NOW to come back to it.
4. Turn the phone toward the sun's mark to see where it will sit in your frame.

Each golden and blue hour chip gives the window's times and how long it lasts; tap one to move the sun to the middle of it. Golden hour is the sun between 4 degrees below the horizon and 6 degrees above it; blue hour is the sun between 8 and 4 degrees below. The path is colored the same way: day above 6 degrees, then golden hour, blue hour, and night below 8 degrees under the horizon. Beside the clock, AZ and EL give the sun's compass direction and its height.

Plan a place you are not at

Turn on Enter coordinates manually and type a latitude and longitude. The panel's times are then for that place, shown in this device's time zone. The overlay on the picture always uses where the device is.

In the sun panel, location is used only to place the sun. Tagging shots with where they were taken is a separate switch in Settings.

For a full scouting checklist, see how to tech scout.

If that didn't work

If the path sits a few degrees off the real sun, the compass is the cause: see the sun path looks off. Near the poles, UP or DOWN replaces the times on days the sun never sets or never rises, and the panel says when a day has no golden or blue hour.

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Updated November 2, 2026