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

Waxing Gibbous in Cancer

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 98% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 13 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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠5° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

5 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 5 days on 8 January 2044 at 04:02.

Wolf Moon after 1 day

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2044 after 1 day on 14 January 2044 at 18:51.

Moderate tide

There is medium ocean tide on this date. Sun and Moon gravitational forces are not aligned, but meet at very acute angle, so their combined tidal force is moderate.

Apparent angular diameter ∠1967"

Lunar disc appears visually 0.8% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1967" and ∠1951".

Lunation 544 / 1497

The Moon is 13 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 544 of Meeus index or 1497 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.76 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 18 hours and 16 minutes and it is 2 hours and 8 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 5 hours and 32 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 1 hour and 31 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠204.4°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠204.4° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠235.6°.

Moon at perigee

Moon is at perigee at 09:08 about 15 days since last apogee on 28 December 2043 at 19:33 in ♐ Sagittarius the lunar orbit is going to widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth over the upcoming 11 days until point of next apogee on 25 January 2044 at 09:32 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 359 906 km

This perigee Moon is 359 906 km (223 635 mi) away from Earth. It is 2 602 km closer than the mean perigee distance, but it is still 10 450 km further than the closest perigee of 21st century.

Moon before descending node

7 days after ascending node on 6 January 2044 at 06:50 in ♓ Pisces the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 5 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 18 January 2044 at 19:49 in ♍ Virgo.

Moon at northern standstill

At 02:29 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach North declination of ∠28.453°. Over the upcoming 13 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt southward to face maximum declination of ∠-28.503° at the point of next southern standstill in ♐ Sagittarius on 26 January 2044 at 18:54.

Draconic month

7 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♓ Pisces the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 1 day

In 1 day on 14 January 2044 at 18:51 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