Daylight

Night, dawn, daylight and dusk

The light along a drive is worked out from the position of the sun where your car will be, minute by minute, as it moves along the route. It falls into four phases:

DAYLIGHT

From sunrise to sunset.

DUSK

After sunset, until the sun is 6° below the horizon.

NIGHT

Darker than that, until dawn.

DAWN

From the sun 6° below the horizon until sunrise.

Dawn and dusk are the twilight either side of the day, when there is some light in the sky but less on the road. On a long drive the phases can arrive at unexpected times: driving west, you chase the sunset and dusk lasts longer.

Why low light matters

A dark road hides standing water, drifted snow and animals until they are close, and headlights show far less of a bend than daylight does. Cloud and terrain can make twilight feel darker than the sky suggests, and a low sun at either end of the day brings glare.

Darkness does not change a section’s rating. It is shown alongside the weather so you can weigh the two together.

Where it shows

• The captured Apple timeline has a row at each change of light — Night, Dawn, Daylight, Dusk — with how long that light lasts on your drive, captioned with what starts it: First light, Sunrise, Sunset, Twilight ends.
• Trip details totals the time you will drive in night, dawn and dusk as Low-light driving.
• The map can colour the route by light — see The map — and marks where the light changes with sunrise and sunset chips.
• A section’s LIGHT cell says whether the section is in daylight or dark when you reach it, with sunrise and sunset for that section’s own place — which, on a long drive, is not where you started. On Android it names the phase and how long until the next one.

Estimates, not promises

Light times follow the estimated timing of your drive. Leave later, stop on the way or meet traffic, and you reach each stretch at a different time — and in different light. Far enough north in summer or winter there may be no sunrise or sunset to name, and the app shows a dash.

Stops on Android

On Android, the timeline puts light on a strip beside the hour grid; tap it for details. Low-light driving excludes time parked at stops. A light change while parked has no road chip on the map. A stop plan changes when you reach each section, so the light follows the answered itinerary.