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

Waxing Crescent in Taurus

Waxing Crescent on . The illuminated surface of the moon is 2% and growing larger. The lunar cycle is 1 day young.

Moonrise and moonset

The moon rises in the morning and sets in the evening. It is visible toward the southwest 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 ♉ Taurus

Moon is leaving the last ∠4° of ♉ Taurus tropical zodiac sector and will enter ♊ Gemini later.

1 day after New Moon

Previous main lunar phase is the New Moon before 1 day on 26 April 2055 at 23:17.

Flower Moon after 12 days

Next Full Moon is the Flower Moon of May 2055 after 12 days on 11 May 2055 at 02:31.

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 ∠1820"

Lunar disc appears visually 4.6% narrower than solar disc. Moon and Sun apparent angular diameters are ∠1820" and ∠1905".

Lunation 684 / 1637

The Moon is 1 day young and navigating from the beginning to the first part of the current synodic month. This is lunation 684 of Meeus index or 1637 from Brown series.

Synodic month length 29.57 days

The length of this lunation is 29 days, 13 hours and 40 minutes and it is 2 hours and 22 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 56 minutes longer than the mean synodic month length. It is 6 hours and 7 minutes shorter compared to 21st century's longest synodic month length.

Lunar orbit details for

True anomaly ∠221.6°

The true anomaly of the Moon orbit at the beginning of this lunation cycle is ∠221.6° and at the beginning of the next lunar synodic month the true anomaly is going to be ∠254.3°.

Moon after apogee

5 days since point of apogee on 23 April 2055 at 01:56 in ♓ Pisces the lunar orbit is getting narrow while the Moon is moving towards the Earth. It will keep this direction over the next 10 days until the Moon reaches the point of next perigee on 8 May 2055 at 21:10 in ♎ Libra.

Distance to Moon 393 923 km

The Moon is 393 923 km (244 772 mi) away from Earth and getting closer over the next 10 days until the point perigee when Earth-Moon distance is going to be 363 012 km (225 565 mi).

Moon before ascending node

8 days after descending node on 20 April 2055 at 05:33 in ♒ Aquarius the Moon is positioned south of the ecliptic over the following 6 days until the lunar crosses the ecliptic again from South to North in ascending node on 4 May 2055 at 12:19 in ♌ Leo.

Moon before northern standstill

11 days since the last southern standstill on 17 April 2055 at 06:08 in ♑ Capricorn when the Moon has reached South declination of ∠-20.056° the lunar orbit is extending northward over the next 3 days to face maximum declination of ∠20.193° at the point of next northern standstill on 1 May 2055 at 22:10 in ♋ Cancer.

Draconic month

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

Syzygy in 12 days

In 12 days on 11 May 2055 at 02:31 in ♏ Scorpio 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