AbstractRecent work has indicated the presence of a nitric oxide (NO) product channel in the reaction between the higher vibrational levels of the first electronically excited state of molecular nitrogen, N2(A ), and atomic oxygen. A steady‐state model for the N2(A) vibrational distribution in the terrestrial thermosphere is here described and validated by comparison with N2 A‐X, Vegard‐Kaplan dayglow spectra from the Ionospheric Spectroscopy and Atmospheric Chemistry spectrograph. A computationally cheaper method is needed for implementation of the N2(A) chemistry into time‐dependent thermospheric models. It is shown that by scaling the photoelectron impact production of ionized N2 by a Gaussian centered near 100 km, the level‐specific N2(A) production rates between 100 and 200 km can be reproduced to within an average of 5%. This scaling, and thus the N2 electron impact ionization/excitation ratio, is nearly independent of existing uncertainties in the 2–20 nm solar soft X‐ray irradiance. To investigate this independence, the N2 electron‐impact excitation cross sections in the GLOW photoelectron model are replaced with the results of Johnson et al. (2005, https://doi.org/10.1029/2005JA011295) and the multipart work of Malone et al. (2009 https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.79.032704) (Malone, Johnson, Young, et al., 2009, https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-4075/42/22/225202; Malone, Johnson, Kanik, et al., 2009, https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.79.032705; Malone et al., 2009, https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevA.79.032704), together denoted J05M09. Upon updating these cross sections it is found that (1) the total N2 triplet excitation rate remains nearly constant; (2) the steady state N2(A) vibrational distribution is shifted to higher levels; (3) the total N2 singlet excitation rate responsible for the Lyman‐Birge‐Hopfield emission is reduced by 33%. It is argued that adopting the J05M09 cross sections supports (1) the larger X‐ray fluxes measured by the Student Nitric Oxide Explorer (SNOE) and (2) a temperature‐independent N2(A)+O reaction rate coefficient.