August 6, 2026: Summer reaches its midpoint as daylight continues to shorten across the Northern Hemisphere. Compare daylight lengths from Miami and Chicago to Anchorage and Auckland.
by Jeffrey L. Hunt
Chicago, Illinois: Sunrise, 5:50 a.m. CDT; Sunset, 8:03 p.m. CDT. Times are calculated by the US Naval Observatory’s MICA computer program. Check local sources for sunrise and sunset times.
Venus as an Evening Star
Summer’s Midpoint
Summer’s midpoint occurs today at 11:14 p.m. Central Time. The season is 93 days, 15 hours, and 41 minutes long. Summer’s midpoint marks the halfway point between the June solstice and September equinox.
At Chicago’s latitude, the sun is in the sky for 14 hours, 13 minutes, compared to 13 hours, 13 minutes in Miami. Farther north in Anchorage, daylight spans 16 hours, 38 minutes. At that latitude, daylight shrinks by about five minutes each day. At summer’s midpoint, Anchorage experiences only daylight and twilight without complete darkness. Complete darkness returns later this month as the sun sinks farther below the horizon each night.
The sun is overhead at local noon near latitude 16° north, crossing southern Mexico and Central America.
South of the equator in Auckland, daylight spans 10 hours, 24 minutes compared to 13 hours, 48 minutes in Nashville. Both cities are nearly equidistant from the equator. While Nashville is experiencing the latter half of summer, Auckland is in the latter half of winter.
Daylight continues to shorten across the Northern Hemisphere while increasing south of the equator as the September equinox approaches.
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