On 1 January 2025 Norway changed the way every ship in Svalbard is allowed to operate, and most of what you will read about the archipelago online was written before it did. The rules are not small. They decide which ships can sail there, where they can land, how close they can come to a bear and how many people can stand on a beach at once. This is what they say, what they changed, and what they mean for the voyage you are considering.
In short
The Svalbard Environmental Protection Act regulations of 2025 are the strictest in the Arctic. We read them before we recommend a ship, and we think they have made Svalbard better to visit, not worse.
The rules, in plain English
- 43 landing sites: in the national parks and nature reserves, which cover most of the archipelago, landings are now permitted only at 43 named sites. Before 2025 ships could land almost anywhere. Thirty of the sites take up to 200 people; thirteen take 39 at a time.
- 200 passengers: no ship with more than 200 passengers on board may enter the protected areas. The limit is counted on the day, so a larger ship sailing with fewer guests complies.
- 300 metres from a polar bear: ships, Zodiacs and people on foot must keep 300 metres from a bear, and 500 metres between 1 March and 30 June, when bears are denning and hunting on the spring ice. If a bear comes closer, you move away.
- 150 metres from walrus: motorised boats must stay 150 metres from a walrus haul-out, at no more than five knots within 300 metres.
- Five knots near bird cliffs: within 500 metres of the listed colonies during the breeding season.
- No drones: in the protected areas, which means almost everywhere a ship goes.
- No breaking fast ice: ships may not break the sea ice that is attached to the shore, which protects the seals that pup on it and the bears that hunt them.
What changed for the ships
The 200-passenger limit removed the larger expedition ships from the reserves overnight. The lines we sell responded in different ways: Swan Hellenic, Aurora and Quark already sailed under the limit, Ponant caps its Svalbard sailings so the sister ships comply, and Le Commandant Charcot’s North Pole voyages pass through Svalbard waters on the way to the ice. Ask us how the ship you are considering handles it; it is the first thing we check.
The 43 sites changed the shape of a week. Captains and expedition leaders now plan around a shorter list, which means more ships at the best sites in July and more value in the voyages that sail in June, when the reserves are quieter, or that use the sites in the far north-east that only the longer voyages reach. It also means the sites that remain are the best ones: Hornsund, Liefdefjorden, Raudfjorden, Alkefjellet, Kapp Lee, Smeerenburg.
What changed for you
Bears
The honest consequence of the 300-metre rule is that the close bear photograph of the brochures, taken from a Zodiac a boat-length away, is no longer legal in Svalbard. What you get instead is a bear on the ice from the ship or the Zodiac at a distance where it behaves like a bear rather than a subject, and a reason to bring binoculars and a long lens. The sightings have not fallen. The pictures have changed.
Landings
At the 39-person sites the ship lands in groups, which the small ships do in one or two waves and the larger ones in several. It is the clearest argument for a ship under 150 guests in Svalbard, and we make it when it applies. At the 200-person sites nothing has changed for a ship of that size or smaller.
Drones and photography
Leave the drone at home. The ban covers the reserves, the fines are real and the expedition team will ask. Our photography guide covers what works instead, including the long lens the 300-metre rule now requires.
The rules that did not change
- Outside Longyearbyen you carry a rifle or you walk with someone who does. Every expedition landing has armed bear guards from the ship. In town, the boundary signs are the law.
- AECO guidelines: the Association of Arctic Expedition Cruise Operators, to which every line we sell belongs, sets the conduct ashore: stay with the group, take nothing, leave nothing, give wildlife the way.
- Cultural heritage: anything made before 1946, a trapper hut, a whaler’s grave, a bottle on the beach, is protected and may not be touched.
- Heavy fuel oil: banned in Svalbard waters since 2022, which is one reason the ships that sail there are the cleaner ones.
What we think of the rules
We think they are right, and we think they help the guests who choose well. Svalbard was carrying more ships and more people to the same beaches every July, and the bears were paying for it. The new rules reward the small ship, the June sailing, the longer voyage to the north-east and the guest who comes to see the ice rather than to stand next to an animal. Those were the voyages we recommended before 2025, and they are the ones we recommend now.
Questions we are asked about the rules
Can we still see polar bears in Svalbard?
Yes. Around 3,000 bears share the Barents Sea with Svalbard and most voyages of a week or more see one. The law changed the distance, not the odds. No one can promise a sighting, and we never do.
Does the 200-passenger rule apply to the whole Arctic?
No, to the Svalbard national parks and nature reserves only. Greenland and Canada have their own park and community rules, which we also know.
Which ships comply?
Every ship we sell in Svalbard, either by size or by capping its guest numbers on those sailings. We tell you which, and how, for the sailing you are considering.
Are there similar rules in Antarctica?
Antarctica is governed by the Treaty and IAATO: 100 people ashore at a time, five metres from wildlife, no landings from ships over 500 passengers. Svalbard’s rules are now stricter on distance and on ship size.
Read the Svalbard destination page for the ten places the voyages are built around, or how to choose an Arctic expedition ship for what the 200 rule means ship by ship.