Sun Outages - Autumn 2026

We are entering the late-season sun outage period. During this period, depending on geographical location, satellite downlinks may experience brief disturbances due to interference from the sun when it aligns directly behind a satellite.

Autumn sun outages progress from south to north, with the first occurrences expected from late August and the season peaking in early October. Sun outages affecting Eurovision Services’ main teleport reception points and satellites have been identified and taken into account.

Whilst Eurovision Services takes the necessary measures at its teleports to minimise the impact on its services, we cannot monitor sun outages for every reception point. We therefore invite customers to check when sun outages may occur at their reception sites and take the necessary precautions if they are likely to affect their transmissions.

What are sun outages?

A sun outage, also known as sun interference or sun fade, occurs when a receiving earth station, a satellite and the sun become aligned. During this alignment, the strong radio-frequency energy emitted by the sun increases the noise received by the antenna and can temporarily degrade or interrupt the satellite signal.

Sun outages affect satellite downlinks rather than uplinks. Their timing, duration and impact depend on factors including the geographical location of the receiving station, antenna size, received frequency and link margin. Larger antennas are generally affected for a shorter period because of their narrower reception beam.

Sun interference typically lasts only a few minutes, but reception sites should be aware of the expected outage windows and plan accordingly.