Loading…
Sunsipper
Sunsipper · Amsterdam
Sunsipper is a free web app that shows which of Amsterdam's café and restaurant terraces are in the sun right now — and which ones will still be lit when you get there.
You're out, the sky's clear, and you want a seat in the sun in the next fifteen minutes. Open the map to see which terraces are lit now, scrub the slider to watch the sun move, and walk to one that'll still be sunny when you sit down.
Sunsipper works out sun and shade by ray-tracing the sun's position against a 3D model of Amsterdam's buildings — using the City of Amsterdam's official terrace-permit outlines and building heights from 3DBAG (TU Delft). More than a thousand terraces are modeled this way, recalculated weekly and updated through the day as the sun moves. These are modeled estimates from building shadows and the date — real sun for this time of year, not a guess — so they don't account for clouds or trees. How the sun model works →
Check the sun for any time today. Terraces facing an open canal or square hold it longest; narrow side streets lose it first.
Sun-trap spots cluster in a few parts of town — and along the north banks of the east–west canals.
Sunsipper ray-traces the sun against a 3D model of the city's buildings, using official terrace-permit outlines and 3DBAG building heights. It models the real outdoor seating area, not a guessed point on a map.
They're modeled estimates from building shadows and the date — accurate for where the sun falls, but they don't include clouds, rain, or trees. Treat a “sunny” terrace as very likely sunny, then trust your eyes.
Yes — Sunsipper is a free web app for Amsterdam that shows live which terraces are in the sun and how that changes through the day. Nothing to download.
Open the evening window (after 18:00) on the map; west-facing terraces and open waterfronts like the IJ in Noord hold the late sun longest.