Sunlight is important for humans’ health and wellbeing. With urban densification on the rise, the access to sunlight in people’s homes seems to become more and more of a luxury. This paper aims to study how the access to sunlight is handled in detailed development plans in the town of Umeå. To answer the research questions three detailed development plans were studied. First, the handling of sunlight in the planning descriptions was described. Then a content-analysis was conducted of the consultation reports and the verdicts from the Land and Environment Court in these cases regarding sunlight. The conclusion of the study was that the people affected by the plan wanted the social sustainability and their right to a good quality home environment to be more prioritized in the detailed development planning process. The municipality disagreed and stated that the plans would entail economic and environmental benefits. The Land and Environment Court seemed to, in lack of strict regulations, decide at random if the lack of sunlight would be a significant inconvenience or not for the people affected by the plans.