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I love two things, my girlfriend and the Moon. There’s no doubt that my girl shines like a full moon, but the real Moon has its own unique beauty, its texture, its glow. I really enjoy watching the Moon’s phases and seeing how its illumination changes over time.

So, I created Luna — The Moon Phase Display. “Luna” is the Latin word for “Moon, ” and this device is like having a real moon in your hand or on your wall. It shows the live moon phase based on your current location.

By the way, Subscribe to my YouTube channel for more projects like this. I also update my upcoming projects on Instagram.

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How It Works

The device connects to Wi-Fi and automatically detects your location and coordinates. Based on that, it retrieves the local time and calculates the current phase of the Moon according to your time-zone.

What Are Moon Phases?

In simple terms, moon phases are the different shapes of the sunlit part of the Moon that we can see from Earth.

Think of it like this: The Moon is a giant rock in space that doesn't produce its own light. It shines because it reflects light from the Sun. As the Moon orbits (travels around) the Earth, we see different amounts of this sunlit half.

It's like taking a ball outside in the sunlight and slowly spinning around. You'll see the bright part of the ball change shape, even though the ball itself isn't changing.

The Main Phases

  • 🌑 New Moon: The Moon is between the Earth and the Sun. The side that is lit is facing away from us, so it seems invisible.
  • 🌒 Waxing Crescent: A tiny sliver of light becomes visible on the right side. "Waxing" means it's growing bigger.
  • 🌓 First Quarter: Half of the Moon is illuminated (the right side). It's called a "quarter" moon because it is one-quarter of the way through its cycle.
  • 🌔 Waxing Gibbous: More than half is now lit up and still growing.
  • 🌕 Full Moon: The Earth is between the Sun and the Moon. We see the entire sunlit face, making it look like a perfect, bright circle.
  • 🌖 Waning Gibbous: The light starts to shrink. "Waning" means it's getting smaller. The left side is now lit.
  • 🌗 Last Quarter: The left half of the Moon is illuminated. It's three-quarters of the way through its cycle.
  • 🌘 Waning Crescent: Only a thin sliver on the left side remains before it returns to the New Moon.

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Supplies

For this project, you’ll need just a few components to bring Luna to life:

Waveshare 1.28-inch ESP32-S3 Round Touch Display

This is the heart of the project—a compact yet powerful development board. It features a 1.28-inch capacitive touch LCD, built-in ESP32-S3 MCU, and an onboard 6-axis sensor (3-axis accelerometer + 3-axis gyroscope), making it perfect for interactive projects. It also includes a Li-ion battery charging manager for portable use. With its small form factor and rich features, it’s easy to integrate into DIY builds or final products.

500mAh Li-Po Battery

This rechargeable Li-Po battery provides portable power for the Luna device, ensuring it keeps running even during power outages. A 500mAh capacity is a sweet spot for this project—it’s compact enough to fit inside the 3D-printed case while still delivering several hours of backup time. It also pairs perfectly with the Waveshare ESP32-S3 round display, since the board already has a built-in Li-ion battery charging manager over Type-C, making integration simple and reliable. I chose this battery because it’s lightweight, safe, and provides just the right balance of size, capacity, and compatibility for the display module.

3D-Printed Case

Designed in Tinkercad to fit the ESP32-S3 round display and 500mAh battery snugly. The case has a sleek cylindrical shape, with space for...

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