The magnetic North Pole is moving.

Scientists have reported that the pole’s "rapid" shifts are forcing an early update to a model that helps ships, planes and submarines navigate in the Arctic. A five-year update of the World Magnetic Model was due next year, but the US military requested an unprecedented early review and an update will be released on 30 January, according to the journal Nature and reported by the ABC.

"It (the pole) is moving at about 50 kilometres a year,” said Ciaran Beggan, of the British Geological Survey in Edinburgh. “It didn't move much between 1900 and 1980, but it's really accelerated in the past 40 years."

In most places, smartphone compasses would be pointing fractionally wrong, he added.

So where is the pole going, you ask? Any why?

The magnetic pole has moved from the coast of northern Canada a century ago to the middle of the Arctic Ocean and is headed towards Russia, driven by unpredictable changes in liquid iron deep inside the Earth.

Dr Beggan explained that navigation systems in cars or phones relied on radio waves from satellites so the wandering pole “wouldn't really affect anyone driving a car”.