The snow moon is February’s full moon. In 2026 it is full on Sunday 1 February 2026 at 10:09pm GMT.
Where the name comes from
Royal Museums Greenwich: February's typically cold, snowy weather in North America earned its full moon the name snow moon.
Their guide to the full moon names is where that wording comes from, read on 10 September 2026.
Snow Moon is a name for a month, then, not for a kind of moon.
What there is to see
February is often the clearest month of a British winter, and the Moon is still riding high. If you want one full moon a year to photograph from a UK garden without waiting up, this is a reasonable one to pick.
By February the evenings are lengthening but the Moon is still high, and the air behind a passing cold front is usually the steadiest a British observer gets. Steady air matters more than clear air for detail: it is what decides whether the craters along the terminator hold still in binoculars or swim about. At full moon there is barely any terminator to look at, which is the trade.
What people get wrong about it
That the name is British. It is not: the snow moon is named for North American Februaries, like most of these names, and imported wholesale. February in much of the UK is wetter than it is snowy, so the name describes somebody else's weather.
Snow Moon dates
- 2026: Sunday 1 February 2026 at 10:09pm (GMT)
- 2027: Saturday 20 February 2027 at 11:23pm (GMT)
Times London local, from NASA. The 2027 row carries one source, not two. How these dates were checked.
Where this sits in the year
The snow moon is the second of the 13 full moons in 2026. The one before it is the Wolf Moon on Saturday 3 January 2026, and the one after is the Worm Moon on Tuesday 3 March 2026.
Full moon number 2 of 13 sits in the calendar with every date and London time. For what the Moon is doing on the nights either side of Sunday 1 February 2026 — waxing gibbous before, waning gibbous after — there is the eight phases of the Moon.
Why the date moves every year
The snow moon falls on Sunday 1 February 2026 in 2026 and Saturday 20 February 2027 in 2027 — 384 days apart rather than 365. Twelve lunar cycles fall about eleven days short of the calendar year, which is why February’s moon keeps sliding earlier; run that far enough and a thirteenth moon has to be squeezed in, as 2026 does in May.
Our bias, stated: we sell moon and lunar wall art. None of it is a snow moon as such, because there is nothing to draw — the snow moon looks like every other full moon. What can be got wrong is the drawing itself, and snow moon or no snow moon, how to tell an accurate moon phase print is the checklist for that.
Written by Craig Fearn, Aphelion Prints. Last updated .
