shape of the sunlit portion of the Moon as viewed from Earth From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
The phases of the Moon are the different ways the Moon looks from Earth.
As the Moon orbits around the Earth, the half of the Moon that faces the Sun will be lit up. The different shapes of the lit portion of the Moon that can be seen from Earth are known as phases of the Moon. Each phase repeats itself every 29.5 days.
The same half of the Moon always faces the Earth, because of tidal locking. So the phases will always occur over the same half of the Moon's surface.
A phase is an angle of the Moon to the Earth so it appears differently every day. The Moon goes through eight main phases.
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