Lunar months

Phalguna: where the lunar month falls

Phalguna is the lunar month in which the Sun enters sidereal Pisces. See its dates for 2026 to 2028 and the full Moon behind its name.

01 · In the lunar year

Phalguna is the lunar month in which the Sun enters Pisces.

A lunar month is named from the Sankranti inside it. The new Moon to new Moon month that holds the Sun’s entry into sidereal Pisces is Phalguna, the twelfth month of the lunar year.

Lunar year 2025 to 2026Phalguna 17 February 2026 to 19 March 2026 · the Sun enters Pisces on 15 March 2026

Sankrantis and new Moons from the site’s ephemeris, sidereal, IST. Months are Amanta, counted from new Moon.

02 · The name in the sky

Phalguna’s full Moon falls in or near Purva Phalguni or Uttara Phalguni.

The month names come from nakshatras. With the Sun in the month’s sign, the full Moon stands opposite it, near the nakshatra the month is named after.

3 March 2026, 17:07 ISTFull Moon 3 March 2026, the Moon in Purva Phalguni; the month is named after Purva Phalguni or Uttara Phalguni

Positions from the site’s ephemeris at the moment of full Moon, sidereal.

The twelfth month

Phalguna (फाल्गुन) is the twelfth of the twelve lunar months, after Magha and before Chaitra. Like every lunar month it runs from one new Moon to the next, and it takes its name from the Sankranti that falls inside it: Phalguna is the month in which the Sun enters sidereal Pisces. It belongs to Shishira ritu, one of the six seasons of two months each.

In the Amanta count, from new Moon to new Moon, in IST:

Year	Begins	Ends	Sun enters Pisces	Full Moon
2026	17 Feb, 17:31	19 Mar, 06:53	15 Mar, 00:39	3 Mar, 17:07
2027	8 Mar, 14:59	7 Apr, 05:21	15 Mar, 06:36	22 Mar, 16:13
2028	25 Feb, 16:07	26 Mar, 10:01	14 Mar, 12:51	11 Mar, 06:36

The dates move against the calendar from year to year, by about 19 days later from 2026 to 2027, because twelve lunar months are about 11 days shorter than the solar year; why lunar festival dates change each year explains the drift and the extra months that correct it.

The name and the full Moon

The month names come from nakshatras. With the Sun in Pisces, the full Moon of the month stands opposite it, and Phalguna is named for Purva Phalguni or Uttara Phalguni, the nakshatra the full Moon falls in or near. In the site’s ephemeris the Moon at the full Moon of Phalguna stood in Purva Phalguni in 2026, in Uttara Phalguni in 2027 and in Uttara Phalguni in 2028. The match is to within a nakshatra or two rather than exact: the Sun can be anywhere in its sign when the Moon is full, and the Moon stands opposite wherever the Sun is.

In the Purnimanta count

Where months are counted from full Moon, Phalguna runs from the full Moon of Magha to its own full Moon. Its waxing half is the same in both counts. The waning half that ends an Amanta Phalguna is called Chaitra Krishna in the Purnimanta count, and Purnimanta Phalguna begins instead with the waning half of Amanta Magha, as why a fortnight can have two month names explains.

Festivals

Of the festivals the site has 2026 pages for, Holi fell in Phalguna that year, counted by the Amanta month at noon IST on the festival’s main day.

The lunar month guide lists all twelve names. See today’s lunar month on the Delhi Panchang, or explore another topic in Learn.