Does the Moon Look the Same Everywhere?

April 2024: Jupiter and Moon close approach

Is the Moon Upside-Down in the Other Hemisphere?

If you’ve ever crossed the equator and traveled to the opposite hemisphere, you might have noticed that the Moon looked different.

The phases of the Moon are the same, but they seem to play out in reverse; the waxing and waning happen in the opposite direction of what you’re used to.

VIDEO: Moon phases explained

And, if you look very closely at a Full Moon, you may notice that it looks strangely unfamiliar, the darker lunar lowlands on its surface no longer producing the pareidolic image of the Man in the Moon you’re accustomed to.

It may seem like a fantastical notion to those of us that have never contemplated or experienced it, but it is actually true: people in the opposite hemisphere really do see the Moon upside-down!

It’s You Who’s Upside-Down!

Of course, it makes sense if you think about it: as you move from one side of the planet to another, your orientation relative to things surrounding it in space changes, and you see them from the opposite point of view. In other words, it’s not the Moon that’s upside-down; it’s you!

This means that, technically, you also see the Sun, the stars, and the planets of the solar system upside-down—though that isn’t easily discernible for naked-eye observers. What you might notice is that asterisms or constellations, such as Orion or Aquarius, also have different orientations.

Exactly Upside-Down Only at the Poles

That said, the Moon doesn’t appear flipped by exactly 180 degrees if you compare the view, for example, from North America with that from Australia. The Moon’s apparent orientation depends on your latitude. So, as you move north or south, it will appear to rotate by the angle equivalent to the degrees of latitude you cross.

For example, the difference in latitude between New York (USA) and Sydney (Australia) is about 73 degrees. So, the Moon will appear rotated by that amount to a Sydneyite visiting the Big Apple.

For the same reason, the Moon seems to “lie on its side” when viewed close to the equator, with the Crescent Moon sometimes appearing like a golden boat roaming the night sky.

The only places where the Moon’s disk will appear rotated by precisely 180 degrees are the North Pole versus the South Pole.

Different Paths across the Sky

Another aspect that sets the Moon’s appearance in the Northern Hemisphere apart from its appearance south of the equator is how it traverses the sky.

Wherever you are, the Moon rises somewhere in the east and sets somewhere in the west, just like the Sun. But what happens in between depends on the part of the world you’re in.

North of the equator, the Moon rises at an angle that points toward the south, making it feel like it travels from left to right; in the Southern Hemisphere, it goes north after moonrise, and it looks like it is moving from right to left.

Close to the equator, the Moon rises vertically and passes overhead, hardly deviating north or south, until it vertically drops below the horizon in the west; at the poles, it effectively circles around you on a horizontal path, though it stays below the horizon for about half of each lunar month.

See it for yourself in our Night Sky Map by comparing the Moon’s path today in France (Northern Hemisphere) to its trajectory in Ecuador (close to the equator), in New Zealand (Southern Hemisphere), and at the South Pole!

How can the Full Moon be during the daytime?

Later in the West

Your location also determines when and where the Moon rises and sets.

When you see the Moon depends largely on the longitude (your position on an east-west axis). Moonrise happens when the Earth’s rotation brings the Moon into view from your position. Naturally, this occurs at radically different moments depending on which side of the globe you’re on.

In fact, you don’t have to travel to the end of the world to experience that effect. Just a few miles to the west of where you are, the Moon rises and sets a bit later than at your current location.

Moonrise and moonset happen about an hour later in Indianapolis than in Boston, which is around 1300 km (800 mi) away; the difference between Madrid and Warsaw, bridging a distance of roughly 2300 km or 1400 mi, is about two hours.

By the way, that’s also the reason why ocean tides happen at different times around the world.

That said, compared to the local time, moonrise and moonset times don’t vary much from one place to another: for example, a First Quarter Moon will always rise around noon and set around midnight in each time zone. That’s because the Sun’s apparent movement across the sky, from which we ultimately derive our local time, is primarily caused by the same mechanism as the Moon’s: the Earth’s rotation.

Nobody Sees the Far Side

One thing Moon gazers in all corners of the Earth have in common is the part of the Moon we see.

The Moon’s orbit and rotation are tidally locked to each other, meaning that the same side of the Moon always faces us. (That said, an effect called lunar libration brings a small fraction of the Moon’s far side into view over time.)

Exhibit A: Our Eclipse Livestreams

A fun way of verifying all this is following one of our lunar eclipse livestreams. They usually feature a number of live video feeds from several far-apart locations, making it easy to compare the Moon’s orientation and appearance as seen from different parts of the world. Read more about the factors involved in changing the Moon’s orientation on-screen

As the lunar eclipse progresses and the Earth blocks the Sun’s light from reaching parts of the lunar surface, you can witness how the Earth’s shadow creeps across the Full Moon in different directions.

And yet, each camera is filming the exact same scene—just from different angles.