The Moon and the stars — December 2026

Lunar occultations of stars to magnitude 9.5, computed for your location

Every night the Moon slides in front of stars. A star doesn't fade behind it — it switches off, then switches back on at the other edge, often an hour later. Pick your place and what you observe with; the list keeps what you can realistically see.

Naked eye Binoculars Small telescope (80 mm) Telescope (200 mm)

31 occultations you can see from New Delhi with small telescope (80 mm) this month, on 14 nights · 1103 in all from there

Mon

Tue

Wed

Thu

Fri

Sat

Sun

1 3

1 13

2 14

6 18

2 21

2 24

1 28

Times in IST. A night runs from noon to noon, so an event at 01:30 stays with the evening before. On each Moon, the numbered marks show where on the limb each star disappears or reappears.

Night of Wed 2 Dec

1
03:12:57 HIP 58457 V 7.5
Reappears at the dark limb
19° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 306° · cusp 77°

Night of Thu 3 Dec

1
03:45:04 HIP 62383 V 7.6
Reappears at the dark limb
14° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 346° · cusp 34°

Night of Sat 5 Dec

1
05:10:02 HIP 70382 V 7.3
Reappears at the dark limb
7° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 269° · cusp 78°
2
05:18:07 TYC 6160-1800-1 V 8.1
Reappears at the dark limb
9° up in the ESE · dark sky · PA 305° · cusp 66°
3
06:02:26 HIP 70513 V 7.4
Reappears at the dark limb
17° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 279° · cusp 88°
4
06:02:30 Gaia …3276416 V 8.4
Reappears at the dark limb
17° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 279° · cusp 88°
5
06:03:50 HR 5397 V 6.6
Reappears at the dark limb
17° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 279° · cusp 89°

Night of Sat 12 Dec

1
19:16:03 HR 7643 V 6.0
Disappears at the dark limb
9° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 18° · cusp 26°

Night of Sun 13 Dec

1
18:00:59 HIP 102660 V 6.8
Disappears at the dark limb
31° up in the SW · dusk · PA 26° · cusp 40°
2
20:34:55 Gaia …4190976 V 8.4
Disappears at the dark limb
5° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 52° · cusp 66°

Night of Mon 14 Dec

1
21:01:39 TYC 5799-164-1 V 8.3
Disappears at the dark limb
11° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 52° · cusp 71°
2
21:20:31 HIP 106922 V 7.3
Disappears at the dark limb
8° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 18° · cusp 37°

Night of Thu 17 Dec

1
18:45:10 Gaia …4360704 V 7.0
Disappears at the dark limb
63° up in the S · dark sky · PA 14° · cusp 37°
2
19:54:36 HIP 117776 V 8.0
Disappears at the dark limb
57° up in the SW · dark sky · PA 77° · cusp 80°
3
21:04:30 HIP 117866 V 8.0
Disappears at the dark limb
45° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 112° · cusp 45°
4
22:55:05 TYC 590-60-1 V 7.2
Disappears at the dark limb
23° up in the W · dark sky · PA 85° · cusp 72°
5
22:57:54 TYC 590-192-1 V 7.6
Disappears at the dark limb
22° up in the W · dark sky · PA 77° · cusp 79°
6
23:09:22 HIP 118104 V 7.6
Disappears at the dark limb
20° up in the W · dark sky · PA 101° · cusp 56°

Night of Fri 18 Dec

1
19:12:02 TYC 603-920-1 V 7.3
Disappears at the dark limb
70° up in the S · dark sky · PA 89° · cusp 69°

Night of Sun 20 Dec

1
23:04:25 26 Ari V 6.1
Disappears at the dark limb
59° up in the W · dark sky · PA 132° · cusp 34°
2
02:33:20 HIP 12238 V 6.9
Disappears at the dark limb
16° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 73° · cusp 86°

Night of Mon 21 Dec

1
00:28:25 7 Tau V 6.7
Disappears at the dark limb
55° up in the W · dark sky · PA 74° · cusp 79°
2
00:28:25 7 Tau V 6.7
Disappears at the dark limb
55° up in the W · dark sky · PA 73° · cusp 79°
3
00:28:25 7 Tau V 6.7
Disappears at the dark limb
55° up in the W · dark sky · PA 73° · cusp 79°
4
02:48:59 HIP 17034 V 7.1
Disappears at the dark limb
26° up in the WNW · dark sky · PA 51° · cusp 57°

Night of Wed 23 Dec

1
00:00:55 TYC 1870-1884-1 V 7.0
Disappears at the dark limb
89° up in the SSE · dark sky · PA 86° · cusp 42°
2
02:09:26 136 Tau V 4.6
Disappears at the bright limb · reappears 02:51:08 at the bright limb
63° up in the W · dark sky · PA 46° · cusp 3°

Night of Thu 24 Dec

1
00:59:07 39 Gem V 6.2
Reappears at the dark limb
86° up in the SE · dark sky · PA 324° · cusp 26°
2
01:34:48 40 Gem V 6.4
Reappears at the dark limb
84° up in the WSW · dark sky · PA 297° · cusp 53°

Night of Sun 27 Dec

1
04:53:38 31 Leo V 4.5
Disappears at the bright limb · reappears 05:56:26 at the dark limb
68° up in the SW · dark sky · PA 165° · cusp 36°

Night of Mon 28 Dec

1
05:19:06 58 Leo V 4.8
Disappears at the bright limb · reappears 06:37:02 at the dark limb
64° up in the SSW · dark sky · PA 120° · cusp 84°

Reading the list

The Moons are drawn from LRO LOLA topography (a 40 KB relief map), lit by the Sun as it is at that moment and turned to the Moon's real libration: north up, east to the left. A dark-limb event — the star vanishing into, or popping out of, the unlit edge of the Moon — is easy to see. At the bright limb only bright stars show against the glare. PA is where on the limb it happens, measured from north through east; the cusp angle is the distance from the nearest horn of the crescent. graze marks a star passing within 3″ of the edge from your place: a few kilometres from a graze line, where it may blink several times behind mountains.

Instrument	dark limb	bright limb
Naked eye	V ≤ 3.0	V ≤ 1.0
Binoculars	V ≤ 6.5	V ≤ 3.5
Small telescope (80 mm)	V ≤ 8.5	V ≤ 5.5
Telescope (200 mm)	V ≤ 9.5	V ≤ 7.0

Those limits are rules of thumb: the dark-limb limit drops by 2.5 magnitudes × (lit fraction − 0.4) in moonglare and by 1 in twilight; events with the Moon under 5° are left out, and daylight events except for the brightest stars. Stars are from Gaia DR3 to G 9.5, with Hipparcos-2 for the brightest and the Yale Bright Star Catalogue for names; the Moon is from the JPL DE431 ephemeris. Times are for the Moon's mean limb, ±2 s — mountains at the edge can move a contact by a few seconds, and much more near a graze.