The next full moon will peak at 7:30 a.m. EST (1230 GMT) on Saturday, Feb. 24, 2024.
Falling as it does in late winter, February’s lunar cycle is a time of scarcity. If you’ve ever seen Bambi, you may recall seeing Bambi’s mother in a late winter storm, digging for a wisp of dry grass under a snowbank, or desperately tearing at tree bark. Many Christian denominations fast and pray to mark the Lenten season of penitence and sacrifice, which often begins in February (sometimes as late as the beginning of March). The attested Cherokee names for February’s lunar cycle, the Hungry Moon or the Month of the Bony Moon, recall the same theme. The February full moon comes in the hungry depths of winter, when the abundance of the last harvest season has been consumed, but not even the earliest leaf buds have emerged.
Most lunar cycles, you’ll see directions here for how to get the best view of the upcoming full moon. However, February of this year will be a different story, because February’s full moon will be below the horizon at its moment of peak illumination. In New York City, the Moon will rise at about 6 p.m. and set at 7:15 a.m. on the 24th. But all is not lost; because the Moon appears full for a day or so on either side of the moment of peak fullness, the full moon can last for up to three days. So, to get the best view of February’s full moon, we recommend looking for it Friday night or later on Saturday.
Here are the phases of the Moon for this lunar cycle: 
February’s full moon is a ‘micromoon,’ which will appear smaller than normal in the sky.
Micromoons occur when the Moon is at apogee, its farthest orbital distance from Earth. This is the opposite of a supermoon, which occurs when the Moon is at or near perigee (its closest approach to Earth). Like Earth’s orbit around the Sun, the Moon’s orbit around Earth is elliptical, with its distance from Earth varying between 230,000 and 250,000 miles. That differential can mean that during a supermoon, the Moon can appear up to 14% larger in the sky and 30% brighter than it is during a micromoon. For the February 2024 micromoon, according to NASA, the Moon will be approximately 252,234 miles away.
Especially east of the Rockies and south of the Great Lakes, according to the Weather Channel, much of the US receives its yearly peak of snow from February snowstorms. The snowiest, most destructive winter storms frequently come from nor’easters, a type of fast-moving storm front with heavy precipitation on its leading edge and strong winds in its wake. Nor’easters sweep across the Great Plains, through the Ohio River Valley, and then up the East Coast before finally heading out to sea in the North Atlantic.
You can see the legacy of those February snowstorms in the names of various Native American groups whose historical territories lie along that track. Captain Jonathan Carver wrote in the 1760s, after spending time with the Naudowessie (Dakota), that they called February’s lunar month the Snow Moon, “because more snow commonly falls during this month than any other in the winter.” If the harvest was bountiful and a family lucky, it might merely be a lean month. When things didn’t go that well, man and beast alike faced the grim prospect of running short on food.
In the same way that many Northern Hemisphere cultures named January’s full moon for the bitter cold, February’s full moon is often known as the Snow Moon in reference to these powerful storms. Nor’easters are one variety of a type of storm known to meteorologists as an extratropical cyclone—the same type that spawned the catastrophic blizzard of 1978, the 1993 Storm of the Century, the blizzard of 2006, and the Perfect Storm.
Perhaps the most culturally important lunar holiday is the Lunar New Year, celebrated by some two billion people in January or February of each year. The Chinese lunisolar calendar defines the new year as beginning on the second or third new moon after the winter solstice. In some 96% of years, the Lunar New Year is the nearest new moon to the beginning of spring according to the Chinese calendar. Lunar New Year celebrations in Korea and Vietnam frequently fall on the same day as they do in China, due to the shared heritage of their calendars. In 2024, the Chinese Lunar New Year begins on Saturday, Feb. 10.
Lunisolar calendars mark time by accounting for both the phase of the Moon and the time of the solar year. The Gregorian calendar, which is strictly solar, uses intercalary days or “leap days” every four years to keep the years aligned. However, because lunar months don’t divide evenly into solar years, lunar and lunisolar calendars tend to drift. Consequently, some lunisolar calendars (such as the Chinese calendar) intercalate entire months on a regular cycle. When the Chinese calendar does it, it inserts an intercalary lunar month at the end of the solar year, which is how the lunar year can begin two or three new moons after the winter solstice.
On the day before the Chinese New Year, families gather to feast and celebrate. As in Western cultures, fireworks are an important part of celebrating the end of the old year and ensuring an auspicious beginning to the new. The first day of the new year begins the Spring Festival, when friends and families often exchange traditional symbolic gifts, including pepper wine, Mandarin oranges, coins threaded onto red cord, and good-luck money tucked into decorative red envelopes. Much of the symbolism of this holiday centers on luck, longevity, and prosperity. So, in the spirit of the occasion, may this Lunar New Year bring you all three.
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