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Why do we see the Moon during the day?
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Why do we see the Moon during the day?

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Why do we see the Moon during the day?

The Daytime Moon

Most people think of the Moon as a creature of the night. Books, cartoons, and weather symbols all show the Moon for nighttime and the Sun for daytime. So it can feel surprising, even a little strange, to glance up at a bright blue afternoon sky and spot the pale Moon hanging there. But there is nothing unusual about it at all. The Moon spends almost as much time in the daytime sky as it does in the night sky.

The Moon Reflects Sunlight

First, it helps to remember that the Moon does not produce any light of its own. Unlike the Sun, which is a star and shines with its own light, the Moon simply reflects sunlight that strikes its surface. This is true whether it is day or night. The Moon is fairly bright, and crucially, it is bright enough that its reflected light can stand out against the blue glow of the daytime sky, so we can see it even when the Sun is up.

Why Stars Hide But the Moon Doesn't

This raises a fair question: if the Moon is visible in the day, why are the stars not? Stars are actually still up there in the daytime, but the sky is simply too bright for their faint light to be seen against it. The Moon is different because it is so close to Earth, by far the closest object in space to us. Being so near, it appears far larger and brighter in our sky than any star, bright enough to compete with the daytime sky.

A Matter of Timing

The second part of the answer is timing. The Moon orbits the Earth, taking about a month to go all the way around. Because of this orbit, the Moon rises and sets at different times throughout the month, shifting a little later each day. This means that for much of the month, the Moon is above the horizon during at least part of the daytime. When the Moon happens to be up while the Sun is also up, and it is bright enough and well placed, we get the lovely sight of a Moon in the daytime sky.

Source

This article was written using information from Wikipedia.