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

First Quarter in Pisces

First Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 45% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 7 days young.

* The exact date and time of this First Quarter phase is on 21 December 2020 at 23:41 UTC.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises at noon and sets at midnight. It is visible high in the southern sky in early evening.

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 in ♓ Pisces

Moon is passing about ∠25° of ♓ Pisces tropical zodiac sector.

Cold Moon after 8 days

Next Full Moon is the Cold Moon of December 2020 after 8 days on 30 December 2020 at 03:28.

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 ∠1794"

Lunar disc appears visually 8.4% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1794" and ∠1951".

Lunation 259 / 1212

The Moon is 7 days young and navigating through the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 259 of Meeus index or 1212 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.53 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 12 hours and 44 minutes and it is 1 hour and 21 minutes shorter than the upcoming lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to increase with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at apogee (∠180°).

Lunation length same as the mean

The length of the current synodic month is equal to the mean synodic month length. It is %hours_to_shortest% and %minutes_to_shortest% longer than the 21st century's shortest and %hours_to_longest% and %minutes_to_longest% shorter than the 21st century's longest synodic months.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠30.1°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠30.1° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠53.8°.

Moon before apogee

8 days since point of perigee on 12 December 2020 at 20:42 in ♏ Scorpio the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 3 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 24 December 2020 at 16:32 in ♈ Aries.

Distance to Moon 399 554 km

The Moon is 399 554 km (248 271 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 3 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 405 010 km (251 662 mi).

Moon after descending node

7 days after descending node on 14 December 2020 at 11:03 in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 7 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 28 December 2020 at 15:03 in ♊ Gemini.

Moon after southern standstill

5 days since the last southern standstill on 15 December 2020 at 22:23 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-24.879° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 8 days to face maximum declination of ∠24.868° at the point of next northern standstill on 30 December 2020 at 07:53 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

20 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 8 days

In 8 days on 30 December 2020 at 03:28 in ♋ Cancer the Moon is going to be in a Full Moon geocentric opposition with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Earth-Moon 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