Moonrise and moonset times

Look at moonrise and moonset times in any location and on any day

Try the Moon Clock to find out how long till the next full moon

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moonrise

moonset

The quirks of the lunar calendar

Have you ever wondered why the Moonrise/Moonset tool will sometimes show, on the same date, that moonset time occurs before the moonrise one?

The order is determined by the Earth calendar cycle, rather than the sidereal or celestial one.

In Earth terms, a day is 24 hours, from midnight to midnight. Even more informally, the day starts with the sun rising in the east and ends when the sun sets in the west.

The Moon has a similar cycle, between the time it appears to rise, in the east, to the time it is setting in the west. But that is not the whole story. While the moon is still there in the sky, it is not always visible when the Sun is up. The Moon's rising time is about 50 minutes later every day. While the Earth is going round its own axis in 24 hours, the Moon is moving along its own orbit round the Earth. That means that it takes a bit longer than 24 hours for an observation point on Earth to align with its natural satellite. The moment when the Moon appears to an observer on Earth is not fixed and in certain parts of the lunar cycle it happens late in the afternoon. Moonset will then take place in the morning, after Earth midnight, and it's part of the previous day's cycle.