The Moon Distance Calculator shows the approximate distance between the center of the Moon and the center of the Earth. It provides dates and timing of lunar perigee and apogee, in your local time.
Enter your location in the search box, and the calculator will tell you the dates, times, and the distances of the Moon's closest approach (perigee) to Earth and its farthest distance (apogee) from Earth during the year, in your local time.
Use the year number links above the table to select a different year.
The results are divided into two tables:
Learn more about perigee and apogee
Each row in the tables refers to the smallest and largest distance for each lunar month. This is the time span in which the Moon completes a full revolution around Earth.
As you can see in the tables, the Moon's distance varies slightly from one perigee or apogee to the next. The blue highlights mark the most extreme perigee and apogee in the selected year.
The current, real-time distance between Earth and the Moon is displayed on the Moonrise & Moonset Page, next to Moon Distance near the top of the page.
Lunar perigee and lunar apogee refer to the distance of the Moon from the Earth. The Moon orbits around the Earth in an elliptical path, with one side of the orbit closer to Earth than the other. The point of the orbit closest to the Earth is called the lunar perigee, while the point farthest from the Earth is called the lunar apogee. Learn more about it here
No, as long as the Moon is above the horizon, you are a little closer to the Moon than stated in the Moon Distance Calculator. This is because the calculator shows the distance between the center of the Earth to the center of the Moon. So, when you see the Moon in the sky, the Earth's curvature takes you a little closer to the Moon than the distance stated in the calculator.
Yes, all our date and time calculators, including the Moon Distance Calculator, take into account all DST clock changes.
Yes, but due to potential changes in a country's DST rules and time zones, local dates and timings of lunar perigee and apogee may change in the future.
If you choose a year before the introduction of standard time zone at your location, the calculator will display the time for lunar apogee and perigee in terms of the local mean solar time, which is an average yearly value based on the moment when the Sun passes a location's meridian. This may differ by up to 17 minutes from the time calculated using a watch.
The dates of the lunar perigee and apogee are based on the calendar observed in the location during the selected year. So, if you choose a location that followed the Julian Calendar, the calculator will provide the dates based on that system. However, all present and future dates are based on the Gregorian Calendar.
This service includes all 5000+ locations in our database. Some of our services also include millions of additional locations provided by the GeoNames database. However, these GeoNames locations cannot be selected in this service yet.
The distance calculations are accurate to less than 1 km (0.621 mi) between 1950-2050, while the time calculations are accurate to within 1 minute.
We are a small team with very extensive websites to manage, so, unfortunately, we do not have the capacity to share detailed information about our algorithms or provide programming help.
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