Chandra Darshan 2026-2027: Dates, Sunset and Moonset

Chandra Darshan is the first look at the Moon after Amavasya, taken in the west just after sunset, when the new crescent is still above the horizon. The next new moon falls at 12:32 IST on 9 November 2026, the end of the Diwali Amavasya of 8 November 2026. That evening the Moon sets at 17:15, 15 minutes before the Sun does at New Delhi, so there is no Moon in the sky to look for. On 10 November 2026, the day of Govardhan Puja, it is up for 26 minutes after the 17:30 sunset, and on 11 November 2026, Bhai Dooj, for 73 minutes.

Below are the same three evenings after every new moon to the end of 2027, with the tithi current at sunset, the sunset and moonset clock times, and how many minutes separate them: the whole of the time the Moon is above the western horizon after sunset. For the three new moons before the end of January 2027 there is a second table for twelve cities.

What the Times Are, and What They Are Not

Each evening here is one whose sunset at New Delhi comes after the instant of the new moon. Sunset and moonset are computed from the JPL DE421 ephemeris by the method behind the site’s panchang, and the generator reproduced all 433 New Delhi sunsets from late October 2026 to December 2027, all 15 new moons and 48 published city moonrises to the minute before it wrote a single evening. Moonset is the moment the upper edge of the Moon’s disc meets the refracted horizon, the convention almanacs use and the one behind the site’s moonrise times.

The table does not say whether the crescent will be seen. A Moon a day old is a thread of light low in a bright sky, and whether anyone picks it out depends on haze, cloud, the horizon and the eye. Those are not in any table, so the page gives the geometry and leaves the sighting to the sky. The tithi column gives the tithi current at that sunset, and the age column the hours since the new moon. A panchang that prints a Chandra Darshan entry chooses its evening by its own rule; this page applies none, so in a month whose first evening has the Moon up only a few minutes, the evening a panchang names may be the second in the table.

The First Three Evenings After Each New Moon, New Delhi

When the First Evening Has No Moon

A new moon that falls less than half a day before sunset leaves a Moon so close to the Sun that it can go down first. In this window that happens 3 times, on 9 November 2026, 30 September 2027 and 28 November 2027, and on 4 more first evenings the Moon outlasts the Sun by under ten minutes. In each of those 7 months the second evening is the first on which the Moon stays up a quarter of an hour or more after sunset. The reverse also happens: when the new moon falls in the small hours, the Moon is most of a day old by the first sunset, as on 5 June 2027, after the new moon at 01:10 that morning, when it stays up 54 minutes.

Dooj Ka Chand and the Dwitiya Evening

The name दूज का चाँद, the Moon of the dooj, points to Dwitiya, the second tithi of the bright half. In 12 of the 15 lunations here, exactly one sunset falls inside the Dwitiya, and the tithi column shows which evening it is. In the other 3, the Jyeshtha (5 June), Bhadrapada (1 September) and Kartika (30 October) lunations of 2027, no sunset does: the Dwitiya begins after one sunset and ends before the next, so the evenings run Pratipada, then Tritiya.

Festival days and Dwitiya evenings do not always line up, because a festival is fixed by its own rule. Bhai Dooj 2026 is kept on 11 November 2026 by the Dwitiya at midday, but that Dwitiya ends at 15:53, before sunset, so the Dwitiya evening of that month is the day before, Govardhan Puja. Bhai Dooj 2027, on 31 October 2027, falls in the Kartika lunation that has no Dwitiya sunset at all, with Tritiya current at its 17:37 sunset. The Bhai Dooj 2026 and Govardhan Puja 2026 pages give those festivals’ own timings.

Why a Spring Crescent Stays Up Longer

The Moon gains about twelve degrees on the Sun a day, but how much of that turns into time above the horizon after sunset depends on the season. The two second evenings of 8 February 2027 and 2 September 2027 have Moons of almost the same age, 45 and 44 hours, yet the first stays up 96 minutes after sunset and the second 52.

Dividing each second evening’s minutes by the Moon’s age in hours puts the pattern in one number. The three lowest are 10 November 2026, 1 October 2027 and 2 September 2027, all between September and November; the three highest are 7 May 2027, 6 June 2027 and 8 April 2027, all between April and June, the evenings of spring and early summer. The main cause is the angle at which the Sun’s path, which the Moon stays close to, meets the western horizon at dusk. In India’s latitudes it stands steepest on evenings around the March equinox, so a Moon a few degrees east of the Sun is also well above the horizon, and lies lowest along the horizon around the September equinox, so the same distance from the Sun gives far less height. Two more things change from month to month and account for most of the rest: the Moon’s distance north or south of that path, up to about five degrees, and its changing speed along its orbit. The coming month is the extreme: its second evening, 26 minutes on 10 November 2026, is the shortest in the whole window.

Twelve Cities, the Next Three Dwitiya Evenings

Clock times move with longitude, so Kolkata’s sunset comes well before Mumbai’s. The minutes between sunset and moonset move with latitude instead, and in early winter it is the south that keeps the Moon up longer. On 10 November 2026 the Moon stays up 24 minutes in Chandigarh and 41 in Chennai and Bangalore; on 10 December 2026, 54 in Chandigarh and 64 in Chennai and Bangalore. By 9 January 2027 the twelve cities are within 3 minutes of each other. These rows are computed for sea level, so the Delhi row can differ from the table above by a minute.

For other dates, the city panchang pages give sunrise and sunset by city.

In Brief

• Next new moon: 12:32 IST on 9 November 2026
• 9 November 2026: the Moon sets 15 min before the Sun at New Delhi
• 10 November 2026: Dwitiya at sunset, Moon up 26 min after the 17:30 sunset, setting 17:56
• 11 November 2026: Tritiya at sunset, Moon up 73 min, setting 18:42
• Gudi Padwa 2027 lunation: 94 min on 8 April 2027, against 26 min on 10 November 2026
• No Dwitiya sunset: the Jyeshtha (5 June), Bhadrapada (1 September) and Kartika (30 October) lunations of 2027

The dates of the new moons themselves, with the fasts kept on them, are on the Amavasya 2027 list, and the bright and dark halves they open on the Shukla and Krishna paksha dates page. Why the Moon’s month varies in length is on the lunar month length page, and the year’s festivals on the festival calendar. In Hindi: चन्द्र दर्शन 2026-2027: सूर्यास्त और चन्द्रास्त.