Waning Gibbous Moon
Waning Gibbous MoonImage credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio.(large image)

Waning Gibbous in Taurus

Waning Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 84% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 18 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the evening and sets in the morning. It is visible to the southwest and it is high in the sky after midnight.

Moon phases on nearby dates

Slide horizontally to discover the moon phase on nearby dates.

Upcoming main moon phases

Main moon phases of the following lunar cycle.

Moon phase and lunation details

Moon is entering ♉ Taurus

Moon is passing first ∠2° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector.

4 days after Full Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the Full Moon before 4 days on 2 September 2020 at 05:22.

Harvest Moon before 4 days

Next Full Moon is the Hunter Moon of October 2020 after 25 days on 1 October 2020 at 21:05.

Neap tide

There is low ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at big angle, so their combined tidal force is weak.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1768"

Lunar disc appears visually 7.4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1768" and ∠1904".

Lunation 255 / 1208

The Moon is 18 days old and navigating from the middle to the last part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 255 of Meeus index or 1208 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.35 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 8 hours and 19 minutes and it is 12 minutes shorter than the upcoming lunation's length. This is the year's shortest synodic month of 2020. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to decrease with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at perigee (∠0° or ∠360°).

Lunation length shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 4 hours and 26 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 44 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠322.3°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠322.3° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠341.2°.

Moon at apogee

Moon is at apogee at 06:31 about 15 days since last perigee on 21 August 2020 at 10:59 in ♎ Libra the lunar orbit is going to narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth over the upcoming 12 days until point of next perigee on 18 September 2020 at 13:44 in ♎ Libra.

Distance to Moon 405 606 km

This apogee Moon is 405 606 km (252 032 mi) away from Earth. It is 198 km further than the mean apogee distance, but it is still 1 103 km closer than the farthest apogee of 21st century.

Moon before ascending node

10 days after descending node on 27 August 2020 at 11:52 in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 4 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 10 September 2020 at 23:05 in ♊ Gemini.

Moon before northern standstill

8 days since the last southern standstill on 28 August 2020 at 14:06 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-24.219° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 5 days to face maximum declination of ∠24.353° at the point of next northern standstill on 12 September 2020 at 05:25 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

22 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♊ Gemini the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 10 days

In 10 days on 17 September 2020 at 11:00 in ♍ Virgo the Moon is going to be in a New Moon geocentric conjunction with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Moon-Earth syzygy alignment.

Lunar calendar

Sources and credits

Parts of this Lunar Calendar are based on Planetary Ephemeris Data Courtesy of Fred Espenak, www.Astropixels.com

Moon phase image credit to NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio, svs.gsfc.nasa.gov