Chinese Zodiac Years: Find Your Animal and Element by Birth Year

Your Chinese zodiac sign depends on the lunar year you were born in, not the calendar year. Each lunar year carries one of 12 animals and one of five elements, and it begins at Lunar New Year, which falls between January 21 and February 20. If your birthday comes before Lunar New Year in your birth year, your sign belongs to the year before.

The current year, 2026, is the Year of the Fire Horse. It began on Tuesday, February 17, 2026. The table below this guide lists every Lunar New Year date and zodiac sign from 1990 to 2035, including the sign that applies to people born before each year’s new year. The sections here explain how the system works and how to read that table correctly.

The 12 animals of the Chinese zodiac

The animals always run in the same order:

1. Rat
2. Ox
3. Tiger
4. Rabbit
5. Dragon
6. Snake
7. Horse
8. Goat
9. Monkey
10. Rooster
11. Dog
12. Pig

Each animal rules one lunar year, so the same animal returns every 12 years. The years of the Horse include 1990, 2002, 2014 and 2026.

A popular folk tale explains the order with a race called by the Jade Emperor. The Rat wins by riding on the Ox’s back and jumping ahead at the finish, and the Cat misses out entirely. The story is told widely, but historians trace the zodiac to the older Chinese system of 12 “earthly branches” used for counting years, months and hours, not to the legend.

Neighboring cultures adapted the list. Vietnam uses a water buffalo instead of the ox and a cat instead of the rabbit. The eighth animal appears as a goat, sheep or ram depending on the language, because the Chinese word can cover all three. Japan’s twelfth sign is the wild boar.

The five elements and the 60-year cycle

The animal is only half of a full zodiac year. Each year also carries one of five elements, in this order: Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water. Each element lasts two consecutive years, first in its yang form and then in its yin form, which gives ten combinations known as the heavenly stems.

For any year, the last digit gives the element:

Last digit of the year	Element	Polarity
0 or 1	Metal	0 is yang, 1 is yin
2 or 3	Water	2 is yang, 3 is yin
4 or 5	Wood	4 is yang, 5 is yin
6 or 7	Fire	6 is yang, 7 is yin
8 or 9	Earth	8 is yang, 9 is yin

Ten stems and 12 animals line up the same way only once every 60 years, because 60 is the smallest number divisible by both 10 and 12. The current cycle began with the Wood Rat year of 1984, and the one before it with the Wood Rat year of 1924. That is why 2024 was a Wood Dragon year just like 1964, and why 2026 repeats the Fire Horse of 1966.

Some astrology systems also give each animal a fixed element of its own. The element people usually quote with a year, as in “Fire Horse,” is the year element from the table above.

Why the zodiac year starts on Lunar New Year

The zodiac follows the Chinese lunisolar calendar. Its months begin on the day of the new moon, when the Moon and Sun share the same direction in the sky. Twelve lunar months fall about 11 days short of a solar year, so the calendar adds a leap month about seven times every 19 years to stay in step with the seasons. The Hong Kong Observatory’s description of the traditional agricultural calendar covers both rules.

The calendar also anchors itself to the seasons. The month containing the December solstice is numbered the 11th month. Lunar New Year, the first day of the first month, is usually the second new moon after the solstice and occasionally the third, when a leap month intervenes. In practice that keeps it between January 21 and February 20. The equinoxes and solstices guide explains the solstice side of the rule, and moon phases explained covers the new moon side.

The new moon is counted in China’s time zone

The calendar uses the date of the new moon in China, which is eight hours ahead of Universal Time. That can put Lunar New Year one day after the date an American calendar shows for the new moon.

The year 2007 shows the effect. NASA’s phase table puts the new moon at 16:14 Universal Time on February 17, 2007. In New York that was 11:14 a.m. on February 17. In China it was 12:14 a.m. on February 18, and the Hong Kong Observatory’s calendar table lists February 18, 2007 as the first day of the first lunar month. The 2007 calendar on this site shows Lunar New Year on the 18th for that reason.

How to find your Chinese zodiac sign step by step

You need your full birth date, not just the year.

1. Find the Lunar New Year date for your birth year. Use the table below or the Lunar New Year dates page.
2. Compare your birthday with it. On or after Lunar New Year, your sign belongs to your birth year. Before it, your sign belongs to the previous year.
3. Read off the animal. Subtract 4 from the zodiac year and divide by 12. The remainder points to the animal, counting Rat as 0, Ox as 1 and so on through Pig as 11.
4. Read off the element. Use the last digit of the zodiac year in the element table above.

Worked example: born January 25, 1990

1. Lunar New Year 1990 fell on Saturday, January 27, 1990, according to the Hong Kong Observatory’s conversion table.
2. January 25 is two days earlier, so the zodiac year is 1989.
3. 1989 − 4 = 1985. 1985 ÷ 12 = 165 with a remainder of 5, and 5 is the Snake.
4. The last digit of 1989 is 9, which means yin Earth.

The answer is Earth Snake. A person born two days later, on January 27, 1990, is a Metal Horse: 1990 − 4 = 1986, which leaves a remainder of 6, the Horse, and a last digit of 0 means Metal.

Worked example: born in February 2026

Lunar New Year 2026 was Tuesday, February 17. A baby born on February 16, 2026 belongs to zodiac year 2025: 2025 − 4 = 2021, remainder 5, the Snake, and a last digit of 5 means Wood. That child is a Wood Snake. A baby born on February 17 is a Fire Horse: 2022 leaves a remainder of 6, and a last digit of 6 means Fire.

You can confirm the weekday of any birthday with the day of the week calculator and see the full month on the 2026 calendar.

Lunar New Year or the start of spring?

Many zodiac charts, including the table below, change animals at Lunar New Year. Some Chinese astrology systems switch instead at Lichun, the “Start of Spring,” one of 24 solar terms fixed by the Sun’s position. It falls around February 4 each year. The Hong Kong Observatory’s tables label it “Spring Commences” and list it on February 4 in both 1990 and 2026.

The two conventions only disagree for birthdays between the two dates. In 1990, Lunar New Year came on January 27 and Lichun on February 4. Someone born on February 1, 1990 is a Metal Horse by the Lunar New Year rule but an Earth Snake by the Lichun rule. In 2026 the order was reversed: Lichun came on February 4 and Lunar New Year on February 17, so a February 10, 2026 birthday is a Fire Horse under the Lichun rule and a Wood Snake under the Lunar New Year rule.

If you were born in that window, check which convention a horoscope, a festival chart or a family elder is using before deciding which animal is “yours.” Old Calendars’s table follows the Lunar New Year rule throughout.

When you research an older relative’s birth year, the generations by birth year guide is a useful companion: it places the same birth dates in the generational labels used by American researchers.