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Christmas lights and Muskoka's dark-sky by-laws: what Muskoka Lakes, Lake of Bays and Huntsville allow

Yes, Christmas lights are allowed under Muskoka's dark-sky by-laws, within limits: in Muskoka Lakes each festive bulb must be 10 watts or less, or 70 lumens or less, and off from 11 p.m. to sunrise, while Lake of Bays exempts low-wattage Christmas lighting from its aim-down rule but bans laser light for entertainment.

Last updated October 28, 2026 · Reviewed by the Muskoka Christmas Lights team

Are Christmas lights allowed under Muskoka's dark-sky by-laws?

Yes. No township in Muskoka bans holiday lights, but two of them have written rules that apply to them directly, and a third has an outdoor lighting by-law with clear guidance. Low-wattage, warm-white LED on a timer that ends by eleven, aimed at the building and not across the water, meets every one of them. The details matter most on the lakes, where a lit roofline can be seen from a kilometre away on a clear December night.

Each township is the authority on its own by-law. What follows is drawn from their own pages and documents; if your property has an unusual situation, ask the township before you light it.

What does Muskoka Lakes require for festive lighting?

Low-wattage bulbs, switched off overnight. The Township of Muskoka Lakes, which takes in Port Carling, Bala, Windermere, Minett and much of the shoreline of Lakes Muskoka, Rosseau and Joseph, sets out its Dark Sky rules on its by-law enforcement page. For festive lighting:

Bulb limit. Festive lighting bulbs must be 10 watts or less, or 70 lumens or less.
Hours. Festive lighting must be turned off between 11:00 p.m. and sunrise.
Lasers. Laser festive lights may shine only on the building where they are installed.

The same page requires outdoor fixtures generally to be full-cut-off, and in the R4, WR and WOS zones, which include waterfront residential properties, architectural and landscape lighting must also be off from 11 p.m. to sunrise. Fixtures in those zones that predate the rules have until 1 June 2027 to comply.

In practice, LED mini lights and LED C9 bulbs sit comfortably inside the per-bulb limit. Old incandescent C9 strings, still common in cottage sheds, are the ones to check against it before they go back up. The eleven o'clock rule is the one people miss, and it is the reason every Muskoka Lakes install booked here runs on a timer that ends by eleven.

What does Lake of Bays allow?

Christmas lighting is exempt from the rule that most outdoor lighting must aim down. The Township of Lake of Bays' Dark Sky By-law 2013-131, linked from its by-laws page, requires completely shielded, full-cut-off fixtures (section 2.2) and architectural and building lighting aimed down (section 2.5.3). Section 2.5.4 then states that low-wattage lights for decoration purposes such as Christmas lighting and property ornamentation are exempt from section 2.5.3.

Two other parts of the by-law matter for holiday lighting:

No lasers. Section 2.10.1 prohibits laser source light for outdoor advertising or entertainment purposes, so laser projectors are not offered for Lake of Bays properties.
Event exemption. Section 2.12 allows a temporary exemption for an event of up to 96 contiguous hours, which is a process with the Township, not a blanket permission.

Penalties under the by-law are set under the Provincial Offences Act. The key word in the Christmas exemption is low-wattage. A string of LED minis on a birch clump in Baysville is what the clause describes; a bank of bright floods aimed up at a pine is not.

What about Huntsville, Bracebridge and Gravenhurst?

The Town of Huntsville has an outdoor lighting by-law covering residential, commercial and industrial properties. Its Dark Sky Lighting page recommends fully shielded fixtures pointed down, total residential output under 1,000 lumens and warm light at 2700K or lower. That page does not address holiday lighting directly, so it would be wrong to say Huntsville sets festive limits. But warm-white, low-wattage LED on a timer sits well within the spirit of what the Town asks of permanent fixtures, and it is the default for every Huntsville install.

We did not find a festive-lighting rule on the Town of Bracebridge's or the Town of Gravenhurst's websites. That is not the same as there being no rule. If you are lighting a property there and want certainty, the town's by-law office is the place to ask. In Bracebridge the bigger calendar question is the Festival of Lights, which in 2026 runs downtown from 20 November to 4 December.

Does permanent lighting count as festive or architectural lighting?

That is the township's call. A permanent LED channel under the soffit is used for Christmas colours in December and warm white the rest of the year, so it can look like either. Mounted under the eave it lights the wall and the roofline rather than the sky, and its schedule can be set to end at 11 p.m. every night, which satisfies Muskoka Lakes whether the system is read as festive or as architectural lighting on a waterfront property. The permanent lighting page covers how those settings are made.

How do you light a cottage within the rules?

Use LED. Certified, outdoor-rated LED with a Canadian mark such as CSA, cUL or cETL, as Health Canada advises. Check the per-bulb wattage on the box if you are in Muskoka Lakes.
Choose warm white for the lake side. It suits wood, stone and pine, and it does not glare across the water. Colour works well in town and on trees nearer the road.
Aim at the building and the trees. Nothing pointed upward or out over the lake, and no lasers.
Put every circuit on a timer that ends by eleven. That meets Muskoka Lakes and matches the Electrical Safety Authority's advice to turn holiday lights off when you go to bed or leave.
Keep path and tree lights low. Tree and landscape lighting is where glare happens most easily, so it gets the most care.

Does switching off at eleven cost you anything?

It saves you a little. On the Ontario Energy Board's prices from 1 November 2026, lights running from dusk to eleven on a weekday fall mostly in the Time-of-Use off-peak period at 9.1 ¢/kWh after 7 p.m. On the Ultra-Low Overnight plan the cheap 3.7 ¢ period starts at 11 p.m., exactly when Muskoka Lakes requires festive lights to be off, so the lights never use it; they run instead through the 37.7 ¢ weekday window from 4 to 9 p.m. A dusk start rather than a 4 p.m. start keeps that small.

The short version

Low-wattage warm-white LED, aimed at the house, off by eleven, no lasers. That is legal in Muskoka Lakes, exempt from the aim-down rule in Lake of Bays, and in keeping with Huntsville's guidance. Send photos of the property and the township it is in, and the quote will say how each run is set.

Sources

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