The Lighthouse Directory

Welcome to the Lighthouse Directory, providing information and links for more than 24,700 of the world's lighthouses. Follow the Directory's new Bluesky feed (@lhdirectory.bsky.social) for the latest in lighthouse news and Directory updates. Latest update January 10, 2026.

This week the pages for Albania, North Macedonia, Yemen, Western Colombia, the Northwestern Lower Peninsula of Michigan in the U.S.A., Western Cuba, the Chatham Islands of New Zealand, Norfolk Island and the Coral Sea Islands of Australia, Eastern Finnmark County in Norway, Southeastern Hokkaidō Prefecture in Japan, Eastern Shāndōng Province of China, the Solor and Alor Islands in East Nusa Tenggara Province in Indonesia, Palawan Province in the Philippines, and the Côtes d'Armor Department in France have been checked and revised with improved information and many new photos.

Also in the Directory: A Checklist of Lightships in the world. Included are some 127 ships surviving, restored, abandoned, or recently scrapped.

Special thanks this week to Jim Smith for comments on last week's revisions.

GOOGLE SITE SEARCH (of ibiblio.org; include the word "lighthouse" in your search)

 


Chéngshānjiǎo Light, Róngchéng, Shāndōng, China, October 2025
Google Maps photo by Tackielin

A Month of Lighthouse News:

  • January 10. The Northern Lighthouse Board will relight the historic Fresnel lens of the Sumburgh Head Lighthouse in the Shetland islands around February 5 after an 18 month project to repair the lantern room and replace the mercury bath with a mechanical rotation system.
  • January 9. The City of Neenah, Wisconsin, will proceed with a $565,000 restoration of the Neenah Lighthouse on Lake Winibago after a fundraising campaign passed its goal of half that amount.
  • January 8. Good news from Wisconsin: the City of Sheboygan will apply for ownership of the 1905 Sheboygan Breakwater Lighthouse under the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act. It's believed the lighthouse needs about $500,000 in repairs. lighthouse-gets-new-hope-as-city-steps-up-for-repairs
  • January 8. Sad news from Alaska: the lone caretaker at the Point Retreat Lighthouse was found dead in an apparent suicide when staff coming to take the next shift arrived.
  • January 5. In England the North Tyneside Council has approved a project to repair and upgrade the electrical system at the keeper's s house of the St. Mary's Lighthouse. The building is the visitor center for this very popular lighthouse.
  • December 30. The Hamilton-Oshawa Port Authority in Ontario reports on its project to restore the exterior of the brick keeper's house of the 1858 Burlington Canal Lighthouse in Hamilton.
  • December 25. The Sand Point Lighthouse in Escanaba, Upper Michigan, will hold its annual Christmas Open House tomorrow and Saturday, December 26-27. with decorations, cookies, and live music. Admission is free.
  • December 24. The Coast Guard has begun removing lead-contaminated soil from around the West Chop Lighthouse in Martha's Vineyard, Massachusetts, six years after high lead levels were first detected there.
  • December 23. On Lake Superior in western Ontario the government has suspended the operating license of the Friends of Battle Island Lighthouse and closed the island to visitors pending resolution of a First Nations land claim.
  • December 23. Generous donors fund a new optic for the Little Sable Point Lighthouse in western lower Michigan after the lighthouse goes dark for a month.
  • December 20. The Duluth office of the Kraus-Anderson company has completed a Trails and Landscape renovation at the Split Rock Lighthouse in Two Harbors, Minnesota. The work restores historic walkways in modern ADA compliant form.
  • December 20. City Council in Rancho Palos Verdes, California, approves the logo for the 100th anniversary of the Point Vicente Lighthouse. Anniversary celebrations are planned for April and May.
  • December 18. The Coast Guard agrees to return the historic Fresnel lens of the Thomas Point Shoal Lighthouse to Annapolis, Maryland, for display in an exhibit on the lighthouse at the Annapolis Maritime Museum.
  • December 18. In Michigan the Grand Haven City Council is expected to approve plans for a lighthouse interpretive center and gift shop, and to open the Grand Haven Outer Pierhead Lighthouse to visitors by 2027. forward-with-city-council-approval
  • December 17. Dan Spinella of Artworks Florida has completed construction of a new replica first order Fresnel lens for installation in the Cape Hatteras Lighthouse, now being restored by the National Park Service. This is the first 1st order lens built in more than a century.
  • December 15. In Florida WPLG-TV's documentary "200 Years of Cape Florida Lighthouse" won an Emmy just in time for the celebration Wednesday of the 200th anniversary of the light station.
  • December 13. The Benzie County Board of Commissioners in Michigan has approved a $7.354 million contract for construction of a shoreline protection system at Point Betsie Lighthouse. The current system, a concrete apron and seawall,was built in 1944.


Tanjung Tuak Light, Lembata, East Nusa Tenggara, Indonesia, April 2022
Google Maps sphoto by Yosaphat Aditya

About this site
Founded in 1999 (during the relocation of North Carolina's Cape Hatteras lighthouse), the Lighthouse Directory is a tool for research and study concerning lighthouses and efforts to preserve those lighthouses. The Directory provides a brief compilation of basic data for each lighthouse with links to other reliable information available on the Internet. Since the addition of the Hainan page in February 2009 listings cover the entire world. However, this doesn't mean the Directory is complete, because new information continues to come to light.

I'm glad to hear from site visitors, especially if you have lighthouse news or photos of rarely-visited lighthouses.

The Directory has over 30,000 links, and all of them were appropriate and legitimate when they were added. Occasionally, because a web site is hacked or a URL is captured, a link leads not to legitimate information but to an inappropriate site, such as a source of pornography or malicious software. Please let me know if this happens, and I will remove the offending link immediately.

This site is hosted by ibiblio.org, one of the largest free information databases online, maintained as a public service of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.


Cape Melville Light, Balabac, Palawan, Philippines, August 2023
Google Maps photo by Joseph Emmanuel Magallanes

Definitions: What is a lighthouse?
To begin with some basics, an aid to navigation or navaid is a structure placed on or near navigable water to provide visual guidance to mariners. A beacon is an aid to navigation that is fixed in place (that is, not floating). A lighted beacon or lightbeacon is a beacon displaying a light, while an unlit beacon is called a daybeacon. Often, a lighted beacon is simply called a light.

Everyone agrees that a lighthouse is a lightbeacon that is, in some sense, a substantial building. There is some diagreement among lighthouse fans as to whether there should be restrictions on the design of the building, but standard dictionaries in English all have some form of this simple definition: "A lighthouse is a tower carrying a light to guide mariners." Indeed, in many languages the word for a lighthouse translates literally as "light tower" or "fire tower." The Directory adopts this definition: a lighthouse is a tower, at least 4 m (13 ft) tall and more substantial in cross section than a post, mast, or pillar, carrying or designed originally to carry a light to guide mariners.

Many lighthouses are enclosed buildings with walls of stone, brick, wood, concrete, metal, or modern composite materials. Many others are open skeletal (framework) towers of cast iron, steel, or wood. The light at the top of some lighthouses is housed in an enclosed lantern, but many lighthouses have the light exposed with no lantern. Historically lighthouses were powered with a variety of fuels, but today nearly all are solar powered.

The Directory includes listings of certain lights and other sites of interest to lighthouse fans that aren't lighthouses by this definition. The titles of those listings are enclosed in square brackets [...]. In addition, lighthouses destroyed or demolished since 2000 continue to be listed; their names are preceded by the hashtag #.

A light station is a collection of buildings including a lighthouse, staff quarters, and supporting structures such as a fog signal building housing a foghorn or fogbell, a boathouse, an oil house to store fuel for the light, and so on. A century ago all lighthouses required lightkeepers to maintain and operate the light, fog signal, and other equipment. Today practically all aids to navigation operate automatically, but some light stations have resident caretakers, still called keepers, to maintain the property and guard against vandalism.


Phare du Cap Fréhel, Plévenon, Côtes d'Armor, France, October 2023
Instagram photo by Alain Paterne

The lighthouse listings
Dates shown for lighthouses are the dates when the light was first displayed; this may be later than the construction date in some cases. A station establishment date, when listed, is the date when a light was first displayed at or near the same location. Data concerning the characteristics (colors and flash patterns) of lights comes mostly from the U.S. Coast Guard Light List for U.S. lighthouses and from the U.S. NGA List of Lights or available national light lists for lighthouses in other countries.

The focal plane height of a light is the height above the surface of the water at which the light is displayed. (The level of the water surface is usually "mean high water," the level at an average high tide.) In the listings, "focal plane" refers to the focal plane height. A lantern of a lighthouse is a room or structure that actually encloses the light.

The tower heights of the lighthouses themselves should be considered approximate. Different sources use different methods for measuring tower heights, and those heights may actually change due to changes in ground level at the base of the tower.

I have attempted to determine whether lighthouse sites and towers are open to the public. This information is inferred from whatever sources may be available; it is certainly not guaranteed. Please let me know if this information, or any information in the Directory, is incorrect.

Lighthouse listings are marked with ratings of zero to four stars based on the extent to which the light station is open to visitors. Check the ratings key to interpret these ratings.


Kep i Treporteve Light, Vlorë, Albania, February 2021
Google Maps photo by Vitali Nikulenka


Mayyūn (Perim) High Light, Bab el Mendab, Yemen, December 2012
ex-Panoramio photo copyright Bashar Allswas; used by permission

Articles about lighthouses:

Online Light Lists

Online Navigation Charts

Special Resources


Parque Colpuertos Light, Buenaventura, Colombia, December 2019
photo copyright Capt. Peter Mosselberger; used by permission


South Manitou Island Light, Michigan, U.S.A., May 2022
Google Maps photo by Saily


Castillo del Morro Light, Havana, Cuba, July 2024
Instagram photo
by Amanda Laura Prieto Valdés


Frederick Reef Light, Coral Sea Islands, Australia, 2023
ex-Instagram photo by Marco Farini

Regional, state, and local lighthouse preservation organizations are recognized on each U.S. state page. U.S. organizations interested in lighthouse preservation nationally are:

  • The American Lighthouse Foundation, based in Rockland, Maine. ALF encourages preservation efforts throughout the country and holds preservation leases on more than a dozen New England lighthouses.
  • The United States Lighthouse Society, formerly based in San Francisco, has moved to the Point No Point Lighthouse in Hansville, Washington. USLHS has chapters active in the Chesapeake area, Long Island, Oregon, and Washington, and has been active in supporting preservation in other areas as well. The Society also publishes a respected journal, The Keeper's Log, and has a large collection of historic light lists of U.S. lighthouses.

Lighthouses on the Internet: A Researcher's Guide has replaced the list of links formerly on this page.


Vardø Light, Vardø, Finnmark, Norway, November 2022
ex-Instagram photo by Alex Robins


Tomakomai Light, Tomakomai, Hokkaidō, Japan, December 2023
Instagram photo by tsukisamu_hikkoshi_plaza

Mount Pitt Light, Norfolk Island, Australia, June 2018
Google Maps street view by Alex Wolfson


Cape Fournier Light, Owenga, Chatham Islands, New Zealand, March 2011
Blogspot photo posted by simmoontheroad


Ohrid Light, Ohrid, North Macedonia, April 2024
Google Maps photo by Mykhailo Rozputny


Slettnes Light, Gamvik, Finnmark, Norway, August 2022
Google Maps photo by Erik Stoel


Jīmíngdǎo Light, Róngchéng, Shāndōng, China, March 2021
thepapaer.cn travel development photo (no longer online)


Tubbataha Reefs Light, Sulu Sea, Palawan, Philippines, 2019
Philippines Coast Guard photo posted by IALA

Lighthouses of the Americas

Northeastern United States

Southeastern United States and U.S. Caribbean

Midwestern United States

Western United States and U.S. Pacific Territories

Atlantic Canada and St. Pierre

Interior and Western Canada

Bermuda and the West Indies

Mexico

Central America

South America, Antarctica, South Atlantic Ocean

Lighthouses of the Pacific and Indian Oceans, Australia, and Africa

New Zealand and Pacific Islands

Australia

Indian Ocean

Africa

Lighthouses of Europe

Britain and Ireland

France and Monaco

Spain and Portugal

Italy and Malta

Southeastern Europe

Southwestern Russia and Ukraine

Belgium and Netherlands

Germany

Inland Central Europe

Denmark, Faroes, Iceland, and Greenland

Norway (listed south to north)

Sweden (listed south to north)

Poland and the Baltic States

Finland

Northwestern Russia (listed southwest to northeast)

Lighthouses of Asia

Mediterranean Sea, Black Sea and Caspian Sea

Arabia, Iran and Pakistan

India

Southeast Asia

Philippines

Indonesia

China and Taiwan

Korea (listed clockwise around the peninsula)

Japan (listed clockwise around the main islands)

Asiatic Russia


1905 South Fox Island Light, Micigan, U.S.A., June 2024
Facebook photo by Fox Island Lighthouse Association

Thanks to:

Hundreds of lighthouse fans around the world have enriched this site with their assistance, information, suggestions, and corrections. For a long time I tried to maintain a list of these many friends and contacts, but it has grown too long (and too out of date) to display here. However, I must recognize the late Michel Forand for his suggestions and corrections touching essentially every page of this work, and extend thanks to Jeremy D'Entremont, Ted Sarah, Klaus Huelse, and Andreas Köhler, who have followed the development of the Directory for years. More recently Jim Smith has read nearly every page carefully, correcting errors and suggesting useful additions. Each of them has contributed information and support in vital ways, and the Directory would be much less useful without their participation.

In addition to Michel Forand, I want to recognize the contributions of two other experts on lighthouse history who have passed in recent years: Terry Pepper, the Executive Director of the Great Lakes Lighthouse Keepers Association (GLLKA), and Tim Harrison, the founding editor of Lighthouse Digest magazine. Both made useful and supportive comments on the Directory.

Formalities

Written by:

Russ Rowlett, Retired Adjunct Professor of Mathematics and Professor of Education
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

You are welcome to email the author (rowlett@email.unc.edu) with comments and suggestions.

All material in The Lighthouse Directory is copyright 2026 by Russ Rowlett and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Many images are presented by permission of their copyright holders, as noted under the image.

Permission is granted to copy portions of the Directory for personal use and study, but all other rights are reserved. You are welcome to make links to this page or to any page of the Directory, provided you credit the source and do not present the work as your own.

Please do not copy the contents of any page of the Directory to another site. This is an infringement of copyright, and it also deprives your users of the benefit of improvements and corrections made to the page. Everyone has permission to link to this page or to any page of the Directory.

The information contained in the directory is as accurate as I can make it; please notify me if you find any errors. Neither the author nor the University of North Carolina assumes any liability for uses made of the information presented by this web site.