Moonrise today

Why moonrise changes every day

Moonrise is the moment the upper edge of the moon clears the horizon at your city. The moon moves about 13° a day against the stars, so it rises on average some 50 minutes later each day (anywhere from about 20 to 70 minutes, depending on the season and the moon's path). Near amavasya it rises with the sun and is lost in daylight; near purnima it rises around sunset; in the waning half it rises later and later into the night.

That is also why some calendar days have no moonrise at all: the rise slips past midnight into the next date. The table shows a dash on such a day, and the moon rises early the following morning.

When the moonrise matters

Several vrats end only when the moon is seen: Karwa Chauth, every sankashti chaturthi, and for many families the purnima fast. For these the city's own moonrise is the number that matters, and across India it differs from Delhi by a few minutes to well over half an hour. The festival days below are the dates of our calendar (New Delhi); the times are this city's.

How these times are computed

Our engine computes the moon's position for each moment and corrects it for lunar parallax: the moon is near enough that where you stand on the Earth shifts it by up to a degree. The time is taken for the upper limb on the true horizon with standard atmospheric refraction, with no allowance for hills, haze or buildings. Seeing the moon over rooftops can take several minutes longer, which is also why published times for the same city often disagree.