The community council runs a number of cultural activities, such as a cinema, a youth club, a library and a gallery. The town's sports club is Svalbard Turn. Svalbardhallen is an indoor sport centre that includes a multi-sport hall large enough for handball or three badminton courts, a shooting range and a 25-meter (82 ft) swimming pool. Svalbard Church of the Church of Norway has the entire archipelago as its parish. The congregational hall is 126 m (1,360 sq ft) while the sitting room is 112 m (1,210 sq ft). The church is built in half-timber. Svalbardposten is a weekly newspaper published on Friday. Printing takes place in Tromsø and the majority of subscribers live on the mainland. Icepeople, an alternative newspaper in English, is also published weekly. There are two museums in town, Svalbard Museum and the Spitsbergen Airship Museum. Dark Season Blues has been held annually in October since 2003. 20 residents of the town are members of the Liverbirds Svalbard and regularly meet in the Svalbar on match days during the winter months. Arctic Film Festival is a film festival which held annually in the city's screening venue, Kulturhuset.

Longyearbyen, the largest settlement in Svalbard, is located in the lower portion of the Longyear Valley, along the Longyear River. The lower parts of the town lie along the southwestern shore of the bay of Adventfjorden, a 7-by-4-kilometer (4 ⁄₂ by 2 ⁄₂ mi) branch of Isfjorden. Longyearbyen is on the Nordenskiöld Land peninsula of Spitsbergen, the largest island of the Svalbard archipelago. It is the world's northern-most town, with all settlements further north being research or meteorological outposts. Across the bay lie the ghost towns of Advent City and Hiorthhamn.

When someday comes you'll need to get in.

When someday comes you'll need to be able to get around.