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Live lunar conditions

Is tonight a Moon night?

An excellent Moon night. The best window is 18:00–07:00; cloud cover looks cooperative.

London· United KingdomDefault locationTuesday, 27 October 2026 · 07:35 · London

Tonight's verdict

An excellent Moon night

Weather-adjusted
80/100
Viewing score 80 out of 100, weather-adjusted, Night viewing.

Excellent

Best window 18:00–07:00 · 13 hrs · Excellent (80/100)

Look ENE · 42° above the horizon · 13 hrs

Phase

Waning Gibbous

Illumination

98%

Next moonrise

Today 16:47

Next moonset

Today 08:46

View tonight's outlookHow the score works

Open-Meteo hourly forecast for 08:00 local · cached up to 20 min

Current moon
Phase-correct

Waning Gibbous · 98% lit

Altitude 8° · Azimuth 295° · 365,778 km

Northern-hemisphere orientation · surface detail schematic

Tonight's outlook

The next 24 hours, without the guesswork

A deterministic viewing score, a recommended window, and the weather that could change the plan. All times are local to London.

Read the scoring method

Best viewing window

18:00–07:00

13 hrs · look ENE · 42° altitude · 22% mean cloud

Tue 27 Oct · local time in London

NightSee it on the timeline

Viewing score

Cloud-weighted, per hour

Weather
80/100
Viewing score 80 out of 100, weather-adjusted, Night viewing.

Excellent

Mostly clear during the best window

Not a scientific measurement. The index favours a Moon that is easy to see, not necessarily the sharpest surface detail.

Best time to look

Best contiguous window in the next 24 hours

Night

18:00–07:00

13 hrs · look ENE · 42° altitude

Starts Tue 27 Oct local time. The window is the longest qualifying run at or above 50/100, selected by mean score.

Weather snapshot

Hourly forecast for the selected location

Open-Meteo

Overcast

98%

Cloud cover · 98% chance of precipitation

14°C nowValid 08:00 local

Moon altitude & cloud cover

Next 24 hours · local time · cloud bars rise from the horizon

Hover or focus an hour for details

Moon altitude Cloud cover Daylight / twilight Now

Weather: Open-Meteo

Tue 27 Oct · 18:00Moon 8°Cloud 0%Score 59 (Fair)Night
0°30°60°90°BEST WINDOWNOW · 07:3508:0011:0014:0017:0020:0023:0002:0005:0008:0008:00 · Moon 5° · Cloud 98% · Score 209:00 · Moon -2° · Cloud 90% · Score 010:00 · Moon -8° · Cloud 71% · Score 011:00 · Moon -12° · Cloud 2% · Score 012:00 · Moon -15° · Cloud 46% · Score 013:00 · Moon -16° · Cloud 18% · Score 014:00 · Moon -14° · Cloud 4% · Score 015:00 · Moon -11° · Cloud 23% · Score 016:00 · Moon -5° · Cloud 2% · Score 017:00 · Moon 1° · Cloud 48% · Score 2318:00 · Moon 8° · Cloud 0% · Score 5919:00 · Moon 17° · Cloud 0% · Score 7620:00 · Moon 26° · Cloud 0% · Score 8421:00 · Moon 35° · Cloud 36% · Score 7522:00 · Moon 44° · Cloud 0% · Score 9923:00 · Moon 52° · Cloud 0% · Score 10000:00 · Moon 59° · Cloud 100% · Score 5501:00 · Moon 63° · Cloud 100% · Score 5502:00 · Moon 62° · Cloud 2% · Score 9903:00 · Moon 58° · Cloud 0% · Score 10004:00 · Moon 51° · Cloud 0% · Score 10005:00 · Moon 42° · Cloud 51% · Score 7206:00 · Moon 33° · Cloud 0% · Score 7207:00 · Moon 25° · Cloud 100% · Score 1808:00 · Moon 16° · Cloud 50% · Score 33
Moon altitude is in degrees above the horizon. Cloud-cover bars run from the bottom of the chart. The highlighted band is the recommended contiguous viewing window; the gold line marks the current local time. Times are local to the selected location.
Hourly Moon viewing forecast
Local timeMoon altitudeCloud coverPrecipitation chanceScoreLight
Tue 27 Oct 08:005 degrees98%98%2 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 09:00-2 degrees90%96%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 10:00-8 degrees71%79%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 11:00-12 degrees2%52%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 12:00-15 degrees46%31%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 13:00-16 degrees18%22%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 14:00-14 degrees4%19%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 15:00-11 degrees23%16%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 16:00-5 degrees2%10%0 out of 100Daylight
Tue 27 Oct 17:001 degrees48%4%23 out of 100Twilight
Tue 27 Oct 18:008 degrees0%0%59 out of 100Night
Tue 27 Oct 19:0017 degrees0%0%76 out of 100Night
Tue 27 Oct 20:0026 degrees0%0%84 out of 100Night
Tue 27 Oct 21:0035 degrees36%0%75 out of 100Night
Tue 27 Oct 22:0044 degrees0%0%99 out of 100Night
Tue 27 Oct 23:0052 degrees0%0%100 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 00:0059 degrees100%0%55 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 01:0063 degrees100%0%55 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 02:0062 degrees2%0%99 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 03:0058 degrees0%0%100 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 04:0051 degrees0%0%100 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 05:0042 degrees51%0%72 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 06:0033 degrees0%0%72 out of 100Night
Wed 28 Oct 07:0025 degrees100%0%18 out of 100Daylight
Wed 28 Oct 08:0016 degrees50%0%33 out of 100Daylight

Why this recommendation

  • Waning Gibbous at 98% illumination. A bright Moon is easy to find, but head-on sunlight reduces surface contrast.
  • The Moon climbs to about 63° around 01:00.
  • Next moonrise: Tue 27 Oct at 16:47.
  • Forecast cloud cover averages 22% during the best window, with a 0% chance of precipitation.
Limitations & methodShow
  • The viewing score is a convenience index, not a scientific measurement of sky quality.
  • The Moon disc on this page is phase-correct but its orientation and surface detail are schematic; libration and parallactic angle are not modelled.
Full methodology →

Look ahead & look closer

The next event. The next detail.

Phase events are calculated from the same ephemeris as the live view. Lunar features are a curated, phase-independent map — never presented as tonight's Moon.

Two ways to go deeper

Next lunar event

Calculated phase · local to London

All events

Sun

1

Nov

Last Quarter Moon

20:28 local · Sun 1 Nov

Below horizonMoon at -13° altitude

Last Quarter Moon occurs at 20:28 local time in London on 1 November. Half of the visible disc is lit on the opposite side from first quarter. Morning observers get the best view of the terminator.

Event details Below the horizon at the exact moment — look near moonrise or moonset

Discover the Moon

Daily featured lunar feature

Map detail
GrimaldiCRATER · SCHEMATIC MAP DETAIL

Grimaldi

Crater

5.2°S · 68.6°W · 222 km

A dark-floored crater near the western limb. Libration can bring it slightly closer to the centre of the disc, making its flooded floor easier to inspect.

Best phase

Waning gibbous to last quarter

Explore the Moon IAU Working Group for Planetary System Nomenclature

Near-Earth neighbour

Earth has a tiny quasi-moon: 2025 PN7

Verified object
SUN2025 PN7EARTHMoonIllustrative orbit · not to scale · not a live position

2025 PN7 is a small near-Earth asteroid in a 1:1 resonance with Earth. It orbits the Sun on roughly the same schedule as our planet, so from Earth it appears to loop nearby. It is not a comet, not a meteor, and not a moon of the Moon.

  • Discovered by Pan-STARRS 1 and announced by the Minor Planet Center on 29 August 2025.
  • Estimated size is roughly 14–30 metres across; it is far too faint for the unaided eye.
  • Dynamical models classify it as a quasi-satellite. It will shift into a horseshoe orbit in about 120 years.
  • Its spectrum is consistent with a primitive B-type asteroid, not lunar ejecta.
Track its current orbit Source: ESA NEO Coordination Centre and Minor Planet Center

Sources & further reading

Images, references and discovery

Official archives for lunar imagery, surface data and current small-body orbits.

External links open the source directly. MoonScan's own lunar map and feature art are generated schematics, not photographs.

The Moon, by the numbers

Six facts worth keeping

Figure sources: NASA and ESA

384,400 km

Mean distance

Light takes about 1.3 seconds to cross the gap between Earth and the Moon.

3,474.8 km

Diameter

Roughly one quarter of Earth's diameter — the Moon is a small world, not a tiny dot.

1.62 m/s²

Surface gravity

About one sixth of Earth's gravity, which is why Apollo astronauts could bound across the surface.

29.5 days

Phase cycle

The time from one new Moon to the next. The Moon's actual orbit around Earth takes 27.3 days.

3.8 cm/year

Drifting away

Lunar laser ranging shows the Moon receding from Earth by roughly the width of two fingers per year.

12

Moonwalkers

Apollo 11 through Apollo 17 put twelve people on the surface between 1969 and 1972.

Elsewhere on Earth

See the same night from another city.

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