What is the Moon doing in November?

The Moon in January

The Moon in February

The Moon in March

The Moon in April

The Moon in May

The Moon in June

The Moon in July

The Moon in August

The Moon in September

The Moon in October

The Moon in November

The Moon in December


In general, we can tell what the Moon will look like, when it will be visible, and in what direction to look for it, just by working out how many days it is since New Moon.  The details are here.

But we can predict this more accurately by noticing that the Moon mimics, every month, the way the Sun behaves over the course of a whole year.


Here is a schematic diagram of how the Moon behaves in November.

moon's path in November

Just after New Moon, the crescent Moon behaves like the Sun in December. It's far to the south, so it spends very little time above the horizon each day. And it's further south than the Sun, so even if it's well to the left of the Sun, it's no higher up than the Sun, which makes it difficult to see.

But towards First Quarter, the Moon starts to move northwards again, and it climbs higher than the Sun. The time of moonrise doesn't change much from one day to the next, but the time of moonset gets later every evening. So we have an increasingly good chance of seeing the Moon in the southern sky after sunset.

As the Moon waxes through gibbous towards Full, it continues to head northwards, staying up later every night. At Full, the Moon is behaving like the Sun in May, spending many hours above the horizon. And it continues to behave like this as it wanes towards Last Quarter: it's still coming up quite early in the night.

As it wanes further, the Moon is moving southwards again, like the Sun in autumn; moonset doesn't change much, but moonrise gets much later every night. In the days before New Moon, we can only glimpse the Moon at sunrise, coming up in the south-east. But it's still further north than the Sun, so we should be able to see it almost all the way up to New Moon.

On any date, if you know how many days it is since New Moon: multiply that by twelve, and add it to the present date, to find out roughly where the Moon will be in its cycle.


However, the Moon doesn't follow the Sun's path exactly. To find out what difference that makes, try clicking here.

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