Astronomical winter begins in one week on the winter solstice, the shortest day of the year. But what does that mean?

Daylight during the winter solstice is actually a whopping nine hours shorter than what we see during the summer solstice.

On the summer solstice, we tend to see around 16 hours 38 minutes of daylight, whereas we see a very meagre 7 hours 50 minutes of daylight on the winter solstice.

This year it is 7 hours, 49 minutes and 42 seconds, to be precise. But, at least the days will start to get a little longer from then on!

While the winter solstice is widely known as the shortest day of the year, did you know that it actually happens at a precise time in the day, but not at the same time every year?

This year the winter solstice will occur at 9:48pm on December 21st in the UK and Ireland, whereas last year, it was at 3:58pm.

The winter solstice may also not occur on the same date. Although the December 21st is the most common, it can happen anytime between December 20th-23rd .

The last winter solstice on December 23rd was in 1903, but this date won't happen again until 2303.