Celebrating the summer solstice and the UK's ancient traditions, thanks to The National Lottery
15th Mehefin 2026
Every year in June, the longest day of the year arrives. The sun stays out later, the evenings feel lighter, and people across the UK mark the summer solstice, a tradition that’s been celebrated for thousands of years. Here’s everything you need to know about one of Britain’s oldest seasonal traditions.
What is the summer solstice?
The summer solstice marks the longest day and shortest night of the year, the high point of summer has been observed since the Neolithic era.
The word 'solstice' comes from the Latin words for sun sol and to stand sistere, because at this time of year, the position of the rising and setting sun appears to stand still in its movement along the horizon. During the summer solstice, the Earth's axis is tilted at its closest point to the sun, meaning that in the Northern Hemisphere the sun is at its highest point in the sky.
It falls on or around 21 June each year. In 2026, the exact moment occurs on Sunday 21 June at 9.24am BST, though as the Royal Observatory Greenwich notes the sun's position remains in much the same place for a few days either side.
Stonehenge: built around the sun
There's nowhere in the UK is more closely associated with the summer solstice than Stonehenge. The heritage site in Wiltshire was created in around 2500 BC, and were designed to align with the movements of the sun.
Standing in the centre of the monument during the summer solstice, the sun rises just to the left of a large standing stone outside the stone circle known as the Heel Stone seen through a gap in the outer sarsen circle. English Heritage's Senior Properties Historian Susan Greaney, notes that excavations suggest the Heel Stone may once have had a partner stone, meaning the sun would have risen framed between the two. The first section of the Stonehenge Avenue is aligned on the same axis, and there is a second alignment to the south-west, towards the midwinter solstice.
Stonehenge is not the only monument in the landscape with these astronomical connections. The concentric timber ovals at nearby Woodhenge were also orientated on the midsummer sunrise, and the Southern Circle at Durrington Walls was aligned on the midwinter sunrise places, as English Heritage describes them, where the power of the skies and celestial bodies could be brought down to earth.
It is likely that people gathered at Stonehenge at both midsummer and midwinter to conduct rituals and ceremonies relating to the changing seasons. The exact reasons may never be fully known, but the intention to align this great monument with the movements of the sun is unmistakable.
Why do people still gather today
The impulse to mark the longest day has never really faded. Each year, English Heritage opens Stonehenge for special managed access events at the summer solstice, welcoming visitors to experience the sunrise among the ancient stones just as people have for thousands of years. English Heritage, which cares for Stonehenge, has benefited from more than £50 million in National Lottery Heritage Fund support across its projects, including a £10 million grant towards transforming the Stonehenge visitor experience, helping more people than ever connect with this extraordinary place.
As Susan Greaney of English Heritage puts it, the movements of the sun, the turning year and the changing seasons were clearly important to the people who built Stonehenge. These were special times when people gathered from far-off communities to hold feasts, ceremonies and rituals. We don't know exactly what those occasions involved, but they would have been memorable and exciting, just as solstice celebrations still are today.
National Lottery players play their part in keeping that story alive. Thanks to Lottery funding, heritage organisations across the UK can preserve, protect and open up the ancient places and traditions that connect us to thousands of years of shared history.