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

Waxing Gibbous in Cancer

Waxing Gibbous on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 90% 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 ♋ Cancer

Moon is passing about ∠5° of ♋ Cancer tropical zodiac sector.

3 days after First Quarter

Previous main lunar phase is the First Quarter before 3 days on 27 January 2053 at 13:41.

Snow Moon after 2 days

Next Full Moon is the Snow Moon of February 2053 after 2 days on 3 February 2053 at 04:57.

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 ∠1971"

Lunar disc appears visually 1.2% wider than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1971" and ∠1947".

Lunation 656 / 1609

The Moon is 11 days young and navigating from the first to the middle part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 656 of Meeus index or 1609 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.72 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 17 hours and 19 minutes and it is 2 hours and 39 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 35 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 2 hours and 28 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠217.6°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠217.6° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠251.9°.

Moon before perigee

15 days since point of apogee on 16 January 2053 at 07:55 in ♐ Sagittarius 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 1 February 2053 at 05:49 in ♋ Cancer.

Distance to Moon 363 692 km

The Moon is 363 692 km (225 988 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next day until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 362 186 km (225 052 mi).

Moon before ascending node

7 days after descending node on 24 January 2053 at 11:46 in ♓ Pisces the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 5 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 6 February 2053 at 03:39 in ♍ Virgo.

Moon at northern standstill

At 05:58 the Moon is meeting its standstill point to reach North declination of ∠18.289°. Over the upcoming 13 days the lunar orbit is going to tilt southward to face maximum declination of ∠-18.230° at the point of next southern standstill in ♐ Sagittarius on 13 February 2053 at 20:10.

Draconic month

21 days since the beginning of this draconic month in ♍ Virgo the Moon is navigating from the second to the final part of the lunar cycle.

Syzygy in 2 days

In 2 days on 3 February 2053 at 04:57 in ♌ Leo 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