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

Waning Crescent in Cancer

Waning Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 9% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 26 days old.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises after midnight to early morning and sets in the afternoon. It is visible in the early morning low to the east.

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 ∠7° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

4 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 4 days on 31 July 2021 at 13:16.

Sturgeon Moon after 17 days

Next Full Moon is the Sturgeon Moon of August 2021 after 17 days on 22 August 2021 at 12:02.

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 ∠1787"

Lunar disc appears visually 5.7% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1787" and ∠1892".

Lunation 266 / 1219

The Moon is 26 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 266 of Meeus index or 1219 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.52 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 12 hours and 34 minutes and it is 1 hour and 32 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 shorter than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 11 minutes shorter than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 59 minutes longer compared to 21st century's shortest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠230.1°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠230.1° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠264.3°.

Moon after apogee

3 days since point of apogee on 2 August 2021 at 07:35 in ♉ Taurus the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 11 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 17 August 2021 at 09:23 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Distance to Moon 401 047 km

The Moon is 401 047 km (249 199 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 11 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 369 127 km (229 365 mi).

Moon after ascending node

2 days after ascending node on 3 August 2021 at 02:51 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 16 August 2021 at 16:04 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Moon at northern standstill

At 16:46 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach North declination of ∠25.685°. Over the upcoming 13 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt southward to face maximum declination of ∠-25.761° at the point of next southern standstill in ♑ Capricorn on 18 August 2021 at 22:24.

Draconic month

2 days 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 3 days

In 3 days on 8 August 2021 at 13:50 in ♌ Leo the Moon is going to be in a New Moon geocentric conjunction with the Sun and thus forming the next Sun-Moon-Earth 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