When is the next blue Moon 2023

Hocken, V., & Kher, A. Look up for a blue moon! What Is a Blue Moon? Retrieved April 21, 2022, from https://www.timeanddate.com/astronomy/moon/blue-moon.html#:~:text=The%20next%20monthly%20Blue%20Moon,are%20traditionally%20called%20Sturgeon%20Moons.&text=There%20is%20no%20Blue%20Moon%20in%202022.

2023 is an exceptional year with 13 Full Moons, four (or two, depending on what source to rely on) Supermoons and one Blue Moon. Track all of them with this calendar and learn their names and meanings.

Contents

  • Full Moon 2023 Calendar
  • Full Moon 2023 names and their meanings
    • January Full Moon: Wolf Moon (January 6)
    • February Full Moon: Snow Moon (February 5)
    • March Full Moon: Worm Moon (March 7)
    • April Full Moon: Pink Moon (April 6)
    • May Full Moon: Flower Moon (May 5)
    • June Full Moon: Strawberry Moon (June 4)
    • July Full Moon: Super Buck Moon (July 3)
    • August Full Moon: Super Sturgeon Moon (August 1)
    • August Full Moon: Super Blue Moon (August 31)
    • September Full Moon: Super Harvest Moon (September 29)
    • October Full Moon: Hunter’s Moon (October 28)
    • November Full Moon: Beaver Moon (November 27)
    • December Full Moon: Cold Moon (December 27)
  • How many Full Moons are there in 2023?
  • F.A.Q.
    • When is the Full Moon in January 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in February 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in March 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in April 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in May 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in June 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in July 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in August 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in September 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in October 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in November 2023?
    • When is the Full Moon in December 2023?

Unfortunately, 2023 is missing a Blood Moon — a Full Moon that coincides with a total lunar eclipse, turning red. The reason is that there will be no total lunar eclipse this year. Find out what eclipses are coming next from our infographic.

List of 5 upcoming lunar and solar eclipses, their dates, timelines, and visibility maps. Find out whether you can see them from your location!

See Infographic

Full Moon 2023 Calendar

Here are the dates and times for each Full Moon this year.

  • January 6, 23:08 GMT (6:08 p.m. EST): Wolf Moon
  • February 5, 18:29 GMT (1:29 p.m. EST): Snow Moon
  • March 7, 12:40 GMT (7:40 a.m. EST): Worm Moon
  • April 6, 04:34 GMT (12:34 a.m. EDT): Pink Moon
  • May 5, 17:34 GMT (1:34 p.m. EDT): Flower Moon
  • June 4, 03:42 GMT (June 3, 11:42 p.m. EDT): Strawberry Moon
  • July 3, 11:39 GMT (7:39 a.m. EDT): Super Buck Moon
  • August 1, 18:31 GMT (2:31 p.m. EDT): Super Sturgeon Moon
  • August 31, 01:35 GMT (August 30, 9:35 p.m. EDT): Super Blue Moon (the biggest Full Moon in 2023)
  • September 29, 09:57 GMT (5:57 a.m. EDT): Super Harvest Moon
  • October 28, 20:24 GMT (4:24 p.m. EDT): Hunter’s Moon
  • November 27, 09:16 GMT (4:16 a.m. EST): Beaver Moon
  • December 27, 03:33 GMT (December 26, 10:33 p.m. EST): Cold Moon

For a visual representation, check out our Full Moons 2023 infographic. Don’t forget to share it with your friends if you like it!

When is the next Full Moon in 2023? When is the Super Blue Moon this year? Check our Full Moon calendar for all dates, times, names, Supermoons, and more for the year.

The Moon will reach full phase. At this time of the month, it is visible for much of the night, rising at around dusk and setting at around dawn.

A Blue Moon

This will be the second full moon of August 2023, making it a blue moon – a term used to describe any full moon which is the second to fall within a single month. This use of the term first appeared in the March 1946 issue of Sky & Telescope magazine, where it was incorrectly stated that this was an established tradition. In fact, it was an entirely new usage of the term, although it had previously been used by the Farmers' Almanac with a different definition. However, the Sky & Telescope article became widely cited, and the term has now entered common usage.

It is possible for two full moons to fall within the same calendar month since the Moon's phases cycle, on average, 12.37 times each year. As a result, once every 2.8 years, a single year contains 13 full moons rather than the usual 12, and in that a year, one of the months must have two full moons.

Put another way, the Moon's phases cycle once every 29.53 days, and so if a full moon occurs on the first or second day of the month, it is possible that that next full moon will occur within the same month.

August 2023: a supermoon?

This month, the moon reaches full phase at around the same time that its elliptical orbit also makes its closest approach to the Earth – called its perigee. In recent times it has become fashionable to describe such full moons as "supermoons" – a term which originated among astrologers in the late 1970s.

The Moon's distance from the Earth varies because its orbit is not perfectly circular – it is slightly oval-shaped, tracing out a path called an ellipse.

As the Moon traverses this elliptical path around the Earth each month, its distance varies by 14%, between 356,500 km at perigee (closest approach to the Earth) and 406,700 km at apogee (furthest from the Earth).

Its angular size also varies by the same factor, between 29.4 arcmin and 33.5 arcmin. When full moon coincides with perigee, it does appear very slightly brighter than at other times, but the difference is so small as to be imperceptible to the untrained eye.

The chart below shows the size of this month's full moon in comparison to the largest (perigee) and smallest (apogee) possible apparent size of a full moon, drawn to scale.

In 2023, two full moons occur close enough to perigee to qualify as "supermoons" by the most common definition of the term: those on 01 August and 31 August.

To emphasise the subtlety of the changes in the Moon's size, the plot below shows the variation in the apparent size of the Moon at each of its full moons in 2023.

The Moon illusion

Although the angular size of the Moon only changes by a very modest amount in reality, a very common optical illusion is that the Moon appears very much larger than it really is when it is close to the horizon. This is called the Moon illusion – and is nothing more than an optical illusion. Any photograph will reveal that the Moon is exactly the same size regardless of whether it appears on the horizon or directly overhead.

The reason why we perceive this optical illusion is hotly debated. However, it may explain why some people are convinced that the Moon appears larger on some nights than others, despite the actual changes in its true size being so small.

The Sturgeon Moon

The sequence of full moons that fall through the year are sometimes assigned names such as the "Sturgeon Moon", according to the months and seasons in which they fall. This practice has been popularised in recent decades by the Farmers' Almanac in the United States. The names used by that almanac claim to have ancient origins from Native American tribes. This claim has been examined in detail by Patricia Haddock's book Mysteries of the Moon (1992) and is partially true, but the selection of names is largely arbitrary.

Throughout history a great variety of different names have been given to the sequence of lunar cycles through the year, and modern lists of such names, such as those popularised by the Farmers' Almanac, tend to inevitably be a medley of names taken from many different cultures.

According to the Venerable Bede's De temporum ratione (The Reckoning of Time; 725 AD) – an authoritative account of the calendar used in Saxon England – the lunar month containing the third full moon after the June solstice (within summer) was called the "holy month (Hālig-mōnaþ)".

The biography of Charlemagne (circa 817–833 AD), written a few years after his death, gives a name of the "wood month (Witu-mānod)" for the same lunar month.

However, in the scheme followed by the Farmers' Almanac, which has become rather widely quoted, any full moon in the month of August is called the "Sturgeon" Moon.

Observing the Moon in coming days

Over the nights following 30 August, the Moon will rise around an hour later each day, becoming prominent later in the night. Within a few days, it will only be visible in the pre-dawn and early-morning sky. By the time it reaches last quarter, a week after full moon, it will rise in the middle of the night and set at around noon.

The table below lists the rising and setting times of the moon in the days around full moon:

DateMoonriseMoonsetPhase25 Aug 202316:3500:1377%26 Aug 202317:4201:1586%27 Aug 202318:3602:3393%28 Aug 202319:1704:0198%29 Aug 202319:4705:32100%30 Aug 202319:4705:3299%31 Aug 202320:1107:0094%01 Sep 202320:3108:2688%02 Sep 202320:4909:5079%03 Sep 202321:0711:1170%

The exact moment of full moon

The exact moment of full moon is defined as the time when the Moon's ecliptic longitude is exactly 180° away from the Sun's ecliptic longitude, as observed from the center of the Earth. However, the Moon does not appear in any way special at this instant in time, and a full moon can be observed at any time of night.

At the moment it reaches full phase, the Moon will lie at a declination of 12°27'S in the constellation Aquarius . It will lie at a distance of 357,000 km from the Earth.

The celestial coordinates of the Moon at the time it reaches full phase will be:

ObjectRight AscensionDeclinationConstellationAngular SizeThe Moon22h41m00s12°27'SAquarius33'25"

The coordinates above are given in J2000.0.

Source

The circumstances of this event were computed using the DE430 planetary ephemeris published by the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL).

This event was automatically generated by searching the ephemeris for planetary alignments which are of interest to amateur astronomers, and the text above was generated based on an estimate of your location.

How many blue moons are in 2023?

Upcoming Blue Moons.

What year will have 13 full moons?

What are the Moon's phases? For 2023, there will be 13 full moons. Most of the months will have 1 full moon with the exception of August. For August 2023, a blue moon is on the schedule.

Was there a blue moon in 2022?

The exception is a “blue moon,” the term given to the second full moon in a month or the third of four in a season. The last blue moon was a seasonal one in August 2021. There are no blue moons in 2022. The next blue moon will be in August 2023.

Is there a blue moon in 2024?

The next seasonal Blue Moon will take place on Aug. 19/20, 2024.