What causes the tidal effect?

The tidal effect happens because of how the moon pulls on Earth’s water like a giant invisible magnet.

Imagine you're playing with a bucket of water and a small ball. When you move the ball near the bucket, the water gets pulled toward it, that's what happens between the moon and our oceans. The moon is far away, but it’s big enough to make the water in Earth’s oceans rise up on one side and sink down on the other.

You might think there would only be one high tide when the moon is close, but actually, because Earth is round and spinning, two sides of Earth feel the moon's pull at different times. So you get two high tides (and two low tides) every day.

The water in the oceans isn’t all stuck in one place, it can flow. When the moon pulls on the water, it creates a kind of “bulge” that moves around Earth as our planet spins. That’s why sometimes you feel like the ocean is pushing you or pulling you, just like when you're playing with waves at the beach!