Wednesday’s moon phase today puts a thin waning crescent in the same morning sky as Mercury, giving early risers a short window to catch the pair before sunrise. The Moon passed 5 degrees north of Mercury at 3 p.m. EDT and, about 30 minutes before dawn, hung about 6 degrees above the horizon while Mercury sat 2.5 degrees high in the east.
At that moment, the Moon was just 6-percent-lit and Mercury was shining at magnitude 0.0, with the planet’s disk about 6 inches wide and roughly 66 percent illuminated through a telescope. Earthshine may have been visible on the Moon’s darkened side, a faint glow that can make the unlit portion easier to spot against the brightening sky.
The timing matters because the Moon rose about an hour before the Sun, with moonrise at 5:13 a.m. and sunrise at 6:22 a.m. in the 40° N, 90° W view described for Wednesday, April 15. Sunset was at 7:39 p.m., and moonset came at 5:52 p.m., leaving the crescent low for much of the day and gone before evening twilight ended.
Mars and Neptune were also above the horizon, but both were difficult to view in the bright twilit sky. The Moon passed 4 degrees north of Neptune at 5 p.m. EDT and later moved 4 degrees north of Mars at 9 p.m. EDT, making the day a compact observing guide for anyone tracking how the Moon moved across the morning and evening sky.
For skywatchers, the clearest target was Mercury, not the Moon itself: a 3%-illuminated waning crescent and a bright inner planet close to the horizon before sunrise. The answer to the day’s question is simple — the best look came in the half hour before dawn, when both objects were still low enough to share the eastern sky.