Greenland, month by month
Daylight is computed for Nuuk on the 15th; roads, ferries and prices are the planner's sourced notes. See the country page for how to get there.
The twelve rows
| Month | Daylight (15th) | Roads | Ferries | Prices | Note |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| January | 5 h 24 min (12:54–18:18) | No roads between towns in any month; town streets only | Coastal ship Sarfaq Ittuk (Arctic Umiaq Line) on a reduced winter schedule: check; fjord boats weather-dependent | Low | Air Greenland Nuuk–Keflavík all year (Tuesdays in 2026); Nuuk–Ilulissat several daily |
| February | 8 h 38 min (11:22–20:00) | None between towns | Reduced schedule: check; Disko Bay ice varies | Low to shoulder in Ilulissat | Dog sledding and aurora season opens at Ilulissat |
| March | 11 h 42 min (09:45–21:27) | None between towns | As February | Shoulder in Ilulissat | Best sledding month: light, cold, frozen fjord |
| April | 15 h 05 min (07:54–23:00) | None between towns | As February; sea ice breaking up in Disko Bay, varies | Shoulder | Qaqortoq's new airport opened 16 Apr 2026 (Visit Greenland) |
| May | 18 h 25 min (06:11–00:36) | None between towns | Summer schedule from May or June: check | Shoulder | Icefjord boats resume as the ice allows |
| June | 21 h 04 min (04:55–02:00) | None between towns | Summer schedule; fjord boats daily | High | Icelandair Keflavík–Ilulissat direct begins (June–September, icelandair.com) |
| July | 19 h 45 min (05:41–01:25) | None between towns | Summer schedule | High; Ilulissat beds scarce on cruise days | Whales in the Nuuk fjord and Disko Bay; fog closes airports for a day at a time |
| August | 16 h 26 min (07:18–23:44) | None between towns | Summer schedule | High | First dark nights return to Ilulissat; warmest month |
| September | 13 h 04 min (08:50–21:54) | None between towns | Summer schedule ending: check | Shoulder | Last month of the Keflavík–Ilulissat direct flight; aurora returns |
| October | 9 h 50 min (10:18–20:08) | None between towns | Reduced schedule: check | Low | Air Greenland Copenhagen–Ilulissat weekly from 29 Oct 2026 (route map) |
| November | 6 h 30 min (11:56–18:27) | None between towns | Reduced schedule: check | Low | Darkest access month; Nuuk–Keflavík continues |
| December | 4 h 12 min (13:16–17:28) | None between towns | Reduced schedule: check | Low except Christmas | Nuuk's winter; Ilulissat in the dark |
How to read the rows
Greenland's planner has no road column worth reading, because there is no road between any two towns in any month. What changes through the year is the air and sea access, the ice, and the light, and those three decide whether the five-day add-on from Reykjavík is a summer icefjord trip or a winter sledding trip.
Access through the year
Air Greenland's Nuuk–Keflavík service runs all year, on Tuesdays in its 2026 route map, and Icelandair's Keflavík–Nuuk flights run all year at about two hours twenty. Icelandair's direct Keflavík–Ilulissat flight is a summer service, June to September on its page; outside those months Ilulissat is reached through Nuuk, where Air Greenland flies several times a day all year. From Denmark, Air Greenland flies Copenhagen–Nuuk daily and, from 29 October 2026, Copenhagen–Ilulissat on Wednesdays, with a second weekly departure over Christmas and in March 2027. Nuuk's new airport opened in November 2024, Qaqortoq's on 16 April 2026, and Ilulissat's during 2026, which is why the Copenhagen flights no longer need Kangerlussuaq.
Fog is the seasonal condition. Nuuk and Ilulissat both lose flying days to it in summer, and the Keflavík flight is not daily, so a buffer night in Reykjavík at each end of the add-on is part of the plan in every month.
Sea and ice
The coastal ship Sarfaq Ittuk runs the west coast between Qaqortoq and Ilulissat on a summer schedule with more calls and a winter schedule with fewer; Arctic Umiaq Line's timetable is the source and it changes each year. The fjord boats at Nuuk and the icefjord boats at Ilulissat run from the break-up of the ice in spring to the autumn, with the exact weeks depending on the year. Disko Bay freezes in most winters from around February and the sledding season at Ilulissat runs from then until April, with March the best balance of light and cold.
Light
Nuuk at 64.2°N has about four hours of daylight in mid-December and twenty-one in mid-June, computed with the NOAA formula, almost exactly Reykjavík's range because the two are at the same latitude. Ilulissat at 69.2°N has a computed polar night from 1 December to 12 January and a midnight sun from 22 May to 24 July. The site computes the figure for any date on a route.
Prices
Greenland is upper band for beds in every month and mid to upper for food, with Ilulissat the dearest and the fullest from June to August, when cruise ships add their passengers to a town with few hotels. The shoulder months, May and September, have the boats running and the beds available; the winter months are cheap and dark, with February to April the sledding season at Ilulissat. There is no fuel line in a Greenland ledger because there is no car; Polaroil sets a single national price, published without a date, and it is not carried here.
Journeys in Greenland
- Greenland add-on from Reykjavík, 5 days
Keflavík to Nuuk, Nuuk to Ilulissat and back by air: no roads, no car, 7 hours 40 of flying, two towns, one icefjord. It changes an Iceland trip's length, not its shape.
5 days · Greenland + Iceland0 km · 0 h drivingChecked 1 Nov 2026