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 14% and getting smaller. The lunar cycle is 25 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 ∠6° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after Last Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the Last Quarter before 3 days on 9 August 2050 at 16:48.

Harvest Moon after 18 days

Next Full Moon is the Harvest Moon of September 2050 after 18 days on 1 September 2050 at 09:30.

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 ∠1828"

Lunar disc appears visually 3.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1828" and ∠1894".

Lunation 625 / 1578

The Moon is 25 days old and navigating from the second to the final part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 625 of Meeus index or 1578 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.6 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 14 hours and 31 minutes and it is 1 hour and 31 minutes shorter than the upcoming lunation's length. The lengths of the following synodic months are going to increase with the lunar orbit true anomaly getting closer to the value it has at the point of New Moon at apogee (∠180°).

Lunation length longer than mean

The length of the current synodic month is 1 hour and 47 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 5 hours and 16 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠137°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠137° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠163.4°.

Moon before apogee

9 days since point of perigee on 4 August 2050 at 05:06 in ♒ Aquarius the lunar orbit is getting widen while the Moon is moving away from the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 5 days until the Moon reaches the point of next apogee on 19 August 2050 at 07:00 in ♍ Virgo.

Distance to Moon 392 138 km

The Moon is 392 138 km (243 663 mi) away from Earth and getting further over the next 5 days until the point apogee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 406 488 km (252 580 mi).

Moon after descending node

3 days after descending node on 9 August 2050 at 15:07 in ♉ Taurus the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 10 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 24 August 2050 at 04:22 in ♏ Scorpio.

Moon after northern standstill

1 day since the last northern standstill on 12 August 2050 at 05:19 in ♊ Gemini when the Moon has reached North declination of ∠20.265° the lunar orbit is extending southward over the next 13 days to face maximum declination of ∠-20.123° at the point of next southern standstill on 26 August 2050 at 23:28 in ♐ Sagittarius.

Draconic month

16 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♏ Scorpio the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 3 days

In 3 days on 17 August 2050 at 11:47 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