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Sunrise, brahma muhurta and the lunar day in Los Angeles

California, United States · 34.05°, -118.24° · America/Los Angeles

Written and reviewed by The Kriya Yogi · Updated 21 September 2026

Friday, November 6, 2026

Brahma muhurta

4:42 AM – 5:30 AM

Sunrise

6:18 AM

Sunset

4:57 PM

Daylight

10h 39m

Lunar day (tithi)

Trayodashi

Fortnight

Waning (krishna)

Moon

Waning crescent · 7% lit

Nakshatra

Hasta

Los Angeles sits at the eastern edge of its time zone band in longitude terms, which keeps sunrise comparatively late on the clock for a latitude of 34° north.

Los Angeles has one of the largest concentrations of yoga teachers and styles anywhere in the United States, shaped by decades of cross-pollination between Indian teachers who settled on the West Coast and the city's fitness culture. The climate is mild and dry for most of the year, which is kind to early practice — there is rarely the bitter cold that forces a routine indoors — but late summer and autumn bring wildfire smoke that can make outdoor practice or open-window pranayama genuinely unwise for days at a time; checking local air quality before an outdoor session is worth building into the routine. The marine layer that blankets the coast some mornings can also delay how bright the sky feels well past the computed sunrise, so residents further inland often see a noticeably clearer dawn than those near the beach at the same clock time.

The next ten days in Los Angeles

Times are local to Los Angeles and recalculated every time this page loads. The lunar day shown is the one in force at local sunrise.

DateBrahma muhurtaSunriseSunsetDaylightTithiMoonNakshatra
Fri, Nov 64:42 AM – 5:30 AM6:18 AM4:57 PM10h 39mTrayodashiWaning (krishna)7% · waning crescentHasta
Sat, Nov 74:43 AM – 5:31 AM6:19 AM4:56 PM10h 37mChaturdashiWaning (krishna)3% · waning crescentChitra
Sun, Nov 8Amavasya (new moon)4:44 AM – 5:32 AM6:20 AM4:55 PM10h 35mAmavasyaWaning (krishna)0% · new moonSvati
Mon, Nov 94:45 AM – 5:33 AM6:21 AM4:55 PM10h 34mPratipadaWaxing (shukla)0% · new moonVishakha
Tue, Nov 104:46 AM – 5:34 AM6:22 AM4:54 PM10h 32mDvitiyaWaxing (shukla)2% · waxing crescentAnuradha
Wed, Nov 114:47 AM – 5:35 AM6:23 AM4:53 PM10h 30mTritiyaWaxing (shukla)5% · waxing crescentJyeshtha
Thu, Nov 124:48 AM – 5:36 AM6:24 AM4:52 PM10h 29mChaturthiWaxing (shukla)10% · waxing crescentMula
Fri, Nov 134:49 AM – 5:37 AM6:25 AM4:52 PM10h 27mChaturthiWaxing (shukla)16% · waxing crescentPurva Ashadha
Sat, Nov 144:50 AM – 5:38 AM6:26 AM4:51 PM10h 26mPanchamiWaxing (shukla)24% · waxing crescentPurva Ashadha
Sun, Nov 154:51 AM – 5:39 AM6:27 AM4:50 PM10h 24mShashthiWaxing (shukla)32% · waxing crescentUttara Ashadha

How far the window moves across the year here

At Los Angeles's latitude of 34.1°, the June solstice brings sunrise at roughly 5:43 AM with about 14h 26m of daylight, while the December solstice brings sunrise at roughly 6:55 AM with about 9h 53m. Both figures are computed for this location, not averaged from anywhere else. If the pre-dawn window is out of reach in one half of the year, the tradition's own priority applies: Patanjali's guidance (Yoga Sutras 1.14) is that practice takes hold through long, uninterrupted, earnest attention — consistency first, ideal hour second.

In practice, most people who keep an early routine here do not chase the brahma muhurta window exactly on the days when it falls hardest against their sleep or their working hours. A workable pattern is to pick a fixed clock time that lands inside the window for most of the year, adjust it by a season if the drift becomes extreme, and treat the days it falls slightly outside the ideal 96-to-48-minute band as still worthwhile rather than wasted — the texts describe brahma muhurta as favorable, not as the only valid hour. Seated meditation, pranayama and a short asana warm-up all transfer reasonably well between a strict pre-dawn slot and a slightly later one; what tends to break a habit is not timing drift but skipping the day entirely because the ideal moment has already passed.

Practice timing in Los Angeles

+ What time is brahma muhurta in Los Angeles today?
Working back from a computed sunrise of 6:18 AM, the window runs from about 4:42 AM to 5:30 AM local time — 96 to 48 minutes before sunrise. It moves every day with the Sun, so check the table rather than fixing it in your head.
+ Which lunar day is it in Los Angeles today?
At local sunrise it is Trayodashi, in the waning (krishna) fortnight, with the Moon about 7% illuminated in Hasta. Tithis run between roughly 19 and 26 hours, so a single date can straddle two; the label here is the one in force at sunrise, which is the usual convention.
+ How much does sunrise move across the year in Los Angeles?
At this latitude, the June solstice sunrise falls around 5:43 AM with about 14h 26m of daylight, and the December solstice sunrise around 6:55 AM with about 9h 53m. That spread is exactly why a sunrise-anchored routine and a clock-anchored one diverge.
+ Are these times exact?
Sunrise and sunset are computed for a sea-level horizon and should be within a minute or two of an observatory table; hills, buildings and altitude shift what you actually see. Tithi and nakshatra use truncated lunar series, so near a boundary a full panchanga may label the day differently. Nothing here is intended for ritual muhurta determination.

Method

  • Sunrise, solar noon and sunset: the standard sunrise equation, using the −0.833° altitude convention for the apparent upper limb and refraction at a sea-level horizon.
  • Lunar day and nakshatra: solar and lunar ecliptic longitudes from truncated Meeus series (Jean Meeus, "Astronomical Algorithms"), with tithi as 12° steps of elongation and nakshatra as 13°20′ steps of sidereal longitude under a linear Lahiri-style ayanamsa approximation.
  • Brahma muhurta: the 48-minute muhurta ending one muhurta before sunrise. Conventions vary between teachers; this is the most common arithmetic definition.
  • Not for ritual muhurta determination — for that, use a panchanga computed within your own tradition.

Timing guidance on this page is traditional and practical, not medical. Nothing here is a religious ruling or a substitute for a panchanga from your own lineage.