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

First Quarter in Cancer

First Quarter on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 51% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 7 days young.

* The exact date and time of this First Quarter phase is on 1 April 2020 at 10:21 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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠13° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

Pink Moon after 6 days

Next Full Moon is the Pink Moon of April 2020 after 6 days on 8 April 2020 at 02:35.

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 ∠1880"

Lunar disc appears visually 2.1% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1880" and ∠1919".

Lunation 250 / 1203

The Moon is 7 days young and navigating through the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 250 of Meeus index or 1203 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.71 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 16 hours and 58 minutes and it is 1 hour and 45 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 4 hours and 14 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 49 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠177.9°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠177.9° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠201.8°.

Moon before perigee

7 days since point of apogee on 24 March 2020 at 15:23 in ♈ Aries the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 6 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 7 April 2020 at 18:08 in ♎ Libra.

Distance to Moon 381 177 km

The Moon is 381 177 km (236 852 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 6 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 356 909 km (221 773 mi).

Moon after ascending node

1 day after ascending node on 31 March 2020 at 16:51 in ♊ Gemini 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 13 April 2020 at 02:58 in ♑ Capricorn.

Moon at northern standstill

At 09:12 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach North declination of ∠23.702°. Over the upcoming 12 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt southward to face maximum declination of ∠-23.805° at the point of next southern standstill in ♑ Capricorn on 13 April 2020 at 21:03.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 6 days

In 6 days on 8 April 2020 at 02:35 in ♎ Libra 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