Why are there two tides a day? - Elise Cutts

There are two tides a day because Earth and the Moon pull on water, like when you tug on a rope and it moves.

Imagine the ocean is a big bowl of water, and the Moon is your friend who likes to play tug-of-war. When the Moon pulls on one side of the bowl, that side gets high, that’s a high tide. On the opposite side, the water also moves because Earth is spinning, making another high tide there too.

Think about when you’re on a swing. When you pull forward, your body goes up, that's like one high tide. But when you’re on the other side of the swing, it also feels high because you're moving away from where you started, that’s the second high tide.

In between those two highs, there are two low tides, just like when you’re in the middle of a swing and feel lower than the top. So every day, Earth spins once, and we get two tides, one on each side of the Moon's pull!