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

Waxing Gibbous in Virgo

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 82% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 11 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 ♍ Virgo

Moon is leaving the last ∠3° of ♍ Virgo tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♎ Libra later.

3 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 3 days on 4 May 2055 at 11:10.

Flower Moon after 3 days

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2055 after 3 days on 11 May 2055 at 02:31.

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 ∠1973"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.7% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1973" and ∠1901".

Lunation 684 / 1637

The Moon is 11 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 684 of Meeus index or 1637 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.57 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 13 hours and 40 minutes and it is 2 hours and 22 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 56 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 6 hours and 7 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠221.6°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠221.6° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠254.3°.

Moon before perigee

14 days since point of apogee on 23 April 2055 at 01:56 in ♓ Pisces the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next day until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 8 May 2055 at 21:10 in ♎ Libra.

Distance to Moon 363 312 km

The Moon is 363 312 km (225 752 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next day until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 363 012 km (225 565 mi).

Moon after ascending node

2 days after ascending node on 4 May 2055 at 12:19 in ♌ Leo the Moon is positioned north of the ecliptic over the following 9 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from North to South in descending node on 17 May 2055 at 07:26 in ♒ Aquarius.

Moon after northern standstill

5 days since the last northern standstill on 1 May 2055 at 22:10 in ♋ Cancer when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠20.193° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 7 days to face maximum declination of ∠-20.280° at the point of next southern standstill on 14 May 2055 at 15:50 in ♑ Capricorn.

Draconic month

2 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♌ Leo the Moon is navigating from the beginning to the first part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 3 days

In 3 days on 11 May 2055 at 02:31 in ♏ Scorpio 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