When and where to see the Harvest Moon 2027
The exact moment of full moon is Wednesday, September 15, 2027 at 7:04 PM in New York. The best night to watch is Wednesday, September 15, when the Moon comes up at 6:44 PM, low in the east, about 21 minutes before sunset. It climbs to about 50° above the horizon around 1:05 AM and sets around sunrise the next morning.
A full moon looks full for about three nights. From New York the Moon is 99% lit when it rises the evening before and 99% the evening after, and on those nights it rises 21 minutes and 21 minutes later each evening. Those short gaps are the shallow autumn angle of the Moon's path at work, the effect behind the Harvest and Hunter's Moons.
The Moon is at a declination of +0.4° this time, close to the celestial equator, so it rises near due east and sets near due west, up for about twelve hours. It sits in front of the stars of Pisces.
| City | Exact full moon (local time) |
|---|---|
| Los Angeles | Wednesday, September 15, 2027, 4:04 PM |
| New York | Wednesday, September 15, 2027, 7:04 PM |
| London | Thursday, September 16, 2027, 12:04 AM |
| Berlin | Thursday, September 16, 2027, 1:04 AM |
| New Delhi | Thursday, September 16, 2027, 4:34 AM |
| Tokyo | Thursday, September 16, 2027, 8:04 AM |
| Sydney | Thursday, September 16, 2027, 9:04 AM |
Why is it called the Harvest Moon?
The Harvest Moon is not tied to a month. It is the full moon closest to the September equinox, so it usually falls in September and occasionally in early October. When that happens, the September full moon before it is called the Corn Moon. The name is old in English usage and appears in the almanacs alongside the Native American names.
There is real astronomy behind it. Around the autumn equinox the Moon's path (close to the ecliptic) meets the eastern horizon at a shallow angle in the evening, so on the nights around full moon the Moon rises only about 20 to 30 minutes later each evening at mid-northern latitudes, instead of the usual 50 minutes. That gave farmers several evenings in a row with a bright Moon coming up soon after sunset, extra light to bring in the crops.
Other names for the September full moon
The almanac names are one tradition among many. Native American peoples used hundreds of moon names that followed their own local seasons, and the attributions below are those given by the Old Farmer's Almanac:
- Corn Moon: when it falls in September
- Autumn Moon: general usage
- Leaves Turning Moon: Anishinaabe
- Moon When the Calves Grow Hair: Dakota
- Mid-Autumn Moon: China, Korea and Vietnam, where the 15th day of the 8th lunar month is a major festival
September in nature and the sky
This is the heart of the harvest in the north: apples, pumpkins, grapes and grain are gathered, nights are now as long as days, and the first frosts arrive in northern areas. Trees start to turn red and gold, and huge flocks of birds migrate south.
The Harvest Moon does not look different from other full moons, but because it often rises close to sunset it is seen low in the east in twilight, where it looks large and orange.
Festivals on the Harvest Moon 2027
Many of the world's calendars are lunar, so festivals around the globe fall on this same full moon. Dates below were checked against published calendars; where India and the US keep different dates, both are given.
Mid-Autumn Festival and Chuseok
September 15, 2027
The 15th day of the 8th Chinese lunar month is the great moon festival of East Asia: families gather to admire the full moon and share mooncakes in China, and Korea celebrates Chuseok (September 14 to 16) with ancestral rites and songpyeon rice cakes. In Vietnam it is Tet Trung Thu, a children's lantern festival.
Pitru Paksha
Begins September 16, 2027
The Hindu fortnight of the ancestors starts the day after the Bhadrapada full moon, with Purnima Shraddha on September 15.
Binara Poya
September 15, 2027
Sri Lanka's September full moon remembers the founding of the order of Buddhist nuns.
Supermoon, micromoon or neither?
The Harvest Moon 2027 is 399,341 km from Earth, centre to centre. That is neither a supermoon (closer than 362,500 km) nor a micromoon (farther than 405,000 km); it appears 3.7% narrower than a full moon at the average distance. Of the 12 full moons of 2027, it is the 9th closest. The biggest is the Wolf Moon at 357,635 km and the smallest the Buck Moon at 405,968 km.
The Harvest Moon from the Southern Hemisphere
In the Southern Hemisphere the Harvest Moon is the full moon nearest the March equinox. The September full moon there rises with the long gaps of a spring moon. The full moon happens at the same instant worldwide; in Sydney it is Thursday, September 16, 2027 at 9:04 AM, and the Moon climbs to about 52° there that night, compared with 50° from New York. South of the equator the Moon also looks upside down to northern eyes, with the dark "Man in the Moon" features flipped.
Before and after the Harvest Moon
More: All full moon names · Moon calendar 2027 · Next full moon · Moon phase today