Wednesday 12 August 2026
96% of the sun disappeared
The deepest eclipse over Britain since 1999. Maximum fell between 18:59 and 19:17 BST.
Britain's solar roofs barely felt it.
Nothing like it comes back until 2081. Up to 96% of the sun went dark over Cornwall, and a roof lost somewhere between half a percent and five percent of that day's electricity. Which end of that you landed on came down to which way your roof faces. Here is what we measured, kept as a record.
The whole eclipse, end to end
Every disc below is drawn from the real coverage at that minute, not sketched.
The bite
How much of the sun's disc was covered, minute by minute, for the middle of England.
Where the sun was when it happened
Seen from above, at maximum eclipse. This is the whole reason it cost so little.
9° off a west-facing roof
99° off a south-facing roof
Why almost nothing happened
The eclipse arrived at about 19:13 on an August evening. By then the sun had been up for roughly fourteen hours and had already handed your roof nearly all of the electricity it was ever going to make that day. What was left was the last thin slice of the evening, at a sun angle of about 12°.
Take the sun away completely at 1pm in June and you would have a story. Taking 96% of it away at 19:13 in August took a large bite out of a very small meal.
The roofs that actually lost something were the ones nobody rates
Because the sun was in the west when the moon crossed it, this was a west-facing roof event. A south-facing roof had already wound down for the day and had almost nothing left to give up. A west-facing roof was still working, so it was the one with something to lose. It lost roughly 5 times more than its south-facing neighbour.
Share of the day's generation lost
Modelled on a clear evening, typical pitched roof. It was August in Britain, so for many roofs the cloud got there before the moon did.
- West 4.2%
- North 3.0%
- South-west 2.7%
- Flat 1.6%
- South 0.9%
- East 0.6%
- South-east 0.5%
Which is a decent reminder of something we say the rest of the year too: a west-facing roof is a working roof. It generates later into the evening, when you are home and actually using the electricity. The "south or nothing" rule costs people more than one eclipse ever could.
Times around the country
All times British Summer Time. The eclipse was deepest in the south-west and shallowest in the far north, and it started earlier the further north and west you were.
| Where | Starts | Maximum | Ends | Sun hidden |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Penzance | 18:20 | 19:17 | 20:11 | 95.8% |
| Plymouth | 18:20 | 19:16 | 20:10 | 94.7% |
| Exeter | 18:19 | 19:16 | 20:09 | 94.1% |
| Bournemouth | 18:19 | 19:15 | 20:09 | 93.1% |
| Cardiff | 18:18 | 19:14 | 20:08 | 93.3% |
| Bristol | 18:18 | 19:14 | 20:08 | 93.0% |
| London | 18:18 | 19:14 | 20:07 | 91.5% |
| Birmingham | 18:16 | 19:12 | 20:06 | 91.9% |
| Norwich | 18:16 | 19:12 | 20:04 | 90.0% |
| Liverpool | 18:14 | 19:11 | 20:05 | 92.0% |
| Manchester | 18:14 | 19:11 | 20:04 | 91.5% |
| Leeds | 18:14 | 19:10 | 20:04 | 90.9% |
| Belfast | 18:11 | 19:09 | 20:04 | 93.2% |
| Newcastle | 18:11 | 19:08 | 20:02 | 90.3% |
| Glasgow | 18:09 | 19:07 | 20:01 | 91.5% |
| Edinburgh | 18:09 | 19:06 | 20:01 | 90.8% |
| Aberdeen | 18:07 | 19:04 | 19:58 | 89.7% |
| Inverness | 18:06 | 19:04 | 19:58 | 90.8% |
| Lerwick | 18:02 | 18:59 | 19:53 | 88.4% |
The British Isles wait until 3 September 2081 for anything comparable, when up to 99% of the sun goes. For actual totality it is 23 September 2090, over Cornwall.
Positions computed from standard solar and lunar ephemerides; generation impact is modelled, not measured. How we measure.
The sun is back. Your roof is still there.
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