Total eclipse of the Internet: traffic impacts in Iceland, Spain, and Portugal
The August 12, 2025 total solar eclipse caused a measurable, temporary decline in Internet activity across Europe. Cloudflare Radar data shows that HTTP traffic dropped most sharply when the eclipse reached maximum obscuration, especially in countries along the path of totality. Traffic generally returned to normal within minutes as people resumed using their devices. ## Traffic Drops Matched Eclipse Timing - Cloudflare analyzed HTTP requests in five-minute intervals across affected countries. - Traffic reductions aligned closely with each location’s moment of maximum eclipse. - The strongest declines occurred in Iceland, Ireland, the UK, France, Spain, and Portugal. - Countries with only shallow partial eclipses, including Sweden, Denmark, Poland, and Switzerland, saw little or no decline. - Regions experiencing deep eclipses recorded traffic drops of roughly 15% to 30%. - Traffic typically rebounded shortly after maximum obscuration. ## Eclipse Depth Predicted Internet Activity - Researchers compared each country’s peak solar obscuration with its average traffic change during the surrounding 15-minute window. - The results showed a clear downward relationship: greater obscuration generally produced larger traffic declines. - Local factors such as population density, cloud cover, and time of day caused some variation, but the precise timing supported the eclipse as the primary cause. - Solar obscuration was calculated geometrically using the apparent sizes and positions of the sun and moon, measuring how much of the sun’s disk was covered every five minutes. ## Iceland, Spain, and Portugal Saw the Largest Declines - Country-level traffic changes ranged from a 9.3% increase to a 46.7% decrease. - Iceland, Spain, and Portugal experienced the most dramatic reductions. - Norway and Sweden saw slight increases above normal levels. - Denmark experienced the smallest overall change, while Poland quickly returned to baseline. - Eclipse-day traffic was compared with the median traffic from the three previous Wednesdays, using matching times of day to reduce the effect of unusual weekly patterns. ## Physical Events Reshape Digital Behavior - The findings show that Internet traffic reflects where people direct their attention. - The eclipse reduced online activity because people temporarily stopped using their devices to observe it, not because of technical network problems. - Traffic normalized quickly afterward, demonstrating how a shared real-world event can create a continent-wide but short-lived shift in digital behavior. - Cloudflare Radar can be used to study similar changes during major global events.
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