UK, 
US, 
Australia & 
IrelandAt A Glance
31 December 2023 at a glance
- Day of the week
- 31 December 2023 was a Sunday.
- UK Number One
- The UK Number One single was “Last Christmas” by Wham!.
- Top Film of 2023
- The highest-grossing film worldwide released in 2023 was Barbie.
- Star sign
- The star sign for 31 December is Capricorn.
- Chinese zodiac
- In the Chinese zodiac, 31 December 2023 fell in the Year of the Rabbit.
- Birthstone
- The birthstone for December is Turquoise.
- Moon phase
- The moon phase on 31 December 2023 was Waning Gibbous.
On this day: 31 December
- 2009 Both a blue moon and a lunar eclipse occur.
- 2011 NASA succeeds in putting the first of two Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory satellites in orbit around the Moon.
- 2015 A fire breaks out at the Downtown Address Hotel in Downtown Dubai, United Arab Emirates, located near the Burj Khalifa, two hours before the fireworks display is due to commence. Sixteen injuries were reported; one had a heart attack, another suffered a major injury, and fourteen others with minor injuries.
- 2019 The World Health Organization is informed of cases of pneumonia with an unknown cause, detected in Wuhan. This later turned out to be COVID-19, the cause of the COVID-19 pandemic.
- 2020 The World Health Organization issues its first emergency use validation for a COVID-19 vaccine.
Famous people born on 31 December
- Val Kilmer, American actor (1959–2025)
- Sophia Laforteza, Filipino-American singer (born 2002)
- Alex Ferguson, Scottish footballer and manager (born 1941)
- Charles Edward Stuart, Scottish claimant to the throne of England (1720–1788)
Source: Wikipedia (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Choose your country: the charts, news and leaders change to match.
Events of 2023 in the United Kingdom
A selection from Wikipedia's '2023 in the United Kingdom'. Not a complete list.
- 22 April – Sunak holds an emergency COBRA meeting to discuss the evacuation of British nationals caught up in the Sudan conflict.
- 13 May – The final of the 2023 Eurovision Song Contest takes place in Liverpool. The contest is won by Sweden's Loreen with the song "Tattoo", who becomes only the second person and the first woman to win the contest twice.
- 20 June – British businessmen Hamish Harding and Shahzada Dawood, along with Dawood's son, Suleman, are confirmed as being aboard the missing submersible that disappeared during a voyage to see the wreck of the RMS Titanic two days earlier.
Life in 2023
Prime Minister
Rishi Sunak
Monarch
Charles III
Pint of Beer
£4.80
Loaf of Bread
£1.95
Average House
£291,228
Weekly Wage
£1,035.00
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