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

Waxing Gibbous in Taurus

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 67% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 9 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 is entering ♉ Taurus

Moon is passing first ∠4° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector.

1 day after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 1 day on 2 January 2096 at 23:02.

Wolf Moon after 5 days

Next Full Moon is the Wolf Moon of January 2096 after 5 days on 9 January 2096 at 19:20.

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 ∠1973"

Lunar disc appears visually 1.1% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1973" and ∠1951".

Lunation 1187 / 2140

The Moon is 9 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 1187 of Meeus index or 2140 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.64 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 15 hours and 20 minutes and it is 2 hours and 36 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 36 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 4 hours and 27 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠255°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠255° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠291.7°.

Moon before perigee

14 days since point of apogee on 20 December 2095 at 23:26 in ♎ Libra 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 5 January 2096 at 18:18 in ♉ Taurus.

Distance to Moon 363 362 km

The Moon is 363 362 km (225 783 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next day until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 368 290 km (228 845 mi).

Moon before ascending node

10 days after descending node on 24 December 2095 at 17:49 in ♐ Sagittarius the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 2 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 6 January 2096 at 23:04 in ♊ Gemini.

Moon before northern standstill

8 days since the last southern standstill on 27 December 2095 at 03:42 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-25.640° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 4 days to face maximum declination of ∠25.638° at the point of next northern standstill on 9 January 2096 at 02:58 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

24 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 5 days

In 5 days on 9 January 2096 at 19:20 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