New magnetic field data collected by the British Geological Survey (BGS), and calculations made by OS have shown that the triple alignment of the three Norths: Grid, True, and Magnetic, will align in Scotland in 2026.

In a fascinating Press Release from Ordnance Survey, Mark Greaves, Earth measurement expert at OS, explained:

“Due to refinement of the underlying models and the prediction data, the alignment’s progress has slowed slightly since the initial predictions back in 2022.

“When it crosses the coast at Berwick-upon-Tweed it will have travelled 576km (about 358 miles) in 1127 days so that’s about 511m per day (or about 5.9 mm per second or about 0.013 miles per hour). It will likely be a very long time before the alignment comes around again.”

During the three norths’ time in England, they moved northwards through Poole near the end of 2022, then through Chippenham and Birmingham before reaching Hebden Bridge, West Yorkshire, in October 2024.

The triple alignment then passed though the Pennines, and left England at Berwick-upon-Tweed on 13 December 2025 and moved into the North Sea.

Further predictions suggest that the triple alignment will hit land again at the end of October 2026 in Drums, just south of Newburgh in Scotland. After passing through Mintlaw, its last stop in Scotland will be Fraserburgh around mid-December 2026, before it returns to the North Sea.

Dr Ciarán Beggan, Geophysicist at BGS said:

“The three norths combining in Great Britain has been a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence.

“Although part of geospatial history, there is no impact for navigators, pilots and captains once the alignment leaves, and people will still need to continue to take account of the variation between magnetic north from a compass and grid (or true) north on a map.

“It’s been a privilege to be able to observe this phenomenon over the past few years. The magnetic field is not predictable in the long term, so we don’t know how many hundreds of years it will take for this historic alignment to occur again.”

‘True north’ is the direction to the geographic north pole; ‘grid north’ is where the vertical blue lines shown on Ordnance Survey (OS) maps converge, and ‘magnetic north’ is the direction that a compass needle points as it aligns with the Earth’s magnetic field.