Earth's geographic poles are fixed by the axis of Earth's rotation. On maps, the north and south geographic poles are located at the congruence of lines of longitude. Earth's geographic poles and magnetic poles are not located in the same place—in fact they are hundreds of miles apart. As are all points on Earth, the northern magnetic pole is south of the northern geographic pole (located on the polar ice cap) and is presently located near Bathurst Island in northern Canada, approximately 1,000 mi (1,600 km) from the geographic North Pole. The southern magnetic pole is displaced hundreds of miles away from the southern geographic pole on the Antarctic continent.

Although fixed by the axis of rotation, the geographic poles undergo slight wobble-like displacements in a circular pattern that shift the poles approximately six meters per year. Located on shifting polar ice, the...