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

Waxing Gibbous in Sagittarius

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 82% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 10 days young.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the afternoon and sets after midnight to early morning. It is visible to the southeast in early evening and it is up for most of the night.

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 ♐ Sagittarius

Moon is passing about ∠17° of ♐ Sagittarius tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 3 days on 27 July 2031 at 10:35.

Sturgeon Moon after 3 days

Next Full Moon is the Sturgeon Moon of August 2031 after 3 days on 3 August 2031 at 01:45.

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 ∠1959"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.6% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1959" and ∠1890".

Lunation 390 / 1343

The Moon is 10 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 390 of Meeus index or 1343 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.62 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 14 hours and 52 minutes and it is 37 minutes longer than the upcoming lunation's length. 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 longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 2 hours and 8 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 55 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠188.7°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠188.7° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠213.5°.

Moon before perigee

11 days since point of apogee on 18 July 2031 at 14:28 in ♋ Cancer the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 2 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 2 August 2031 at 06:47 in ♑ Capricorn.

Distance to Moon 365 896 km

The Moon is 365 896 km (227 357 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 2 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 358 060 km (222 488 mi).

Moon after ascending node

1 day after ascending node on 28 July 2031 at 23:54 in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 11 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 10 August 2031 at 14:10 in ♉ Taurus.

Moon at southern standstill

At 15:45 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach South declination of ∠-20.951°. Over the upcoming 13 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt northward to face maximum declination of ∠20.868° at the point of next northern standstill in ♊ Gemini on 12 August 2031 at 15:58.

Draconic month

1 day since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 3 days

In 3 days on 3 August 2031 at 01:45 in ♒ Aquarius 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