Using the calculator
Type your birth date, as 12 January 1982, 1982-01-12 or 01/12/1982, and you get your animal, your element and whether the year is yin or yang. The rows below the answer give the year's traditional name, the dates that year ran, the next year of your animal and the traditional matches. Typing just a year works too, with a note about January and February.
Year starts at chooses where the zodiac year begins. Chinese New Year is the usual choice. Some astrologers start the year at the start of spring instead, a fixed solar date around 4 February, and the two disagree for anyone born in between.
Why January and February birthdays are tricky
Chinese New Year moves. It falls on a new moon, between 21 January and 20 February in every year from 1901 to 2100, so a sign doesn't start on 1 January. Someone born on 12 January 1982 is not a Dog, as a year-only chart says, but a Metal Rooster: New Year 1982 fell on 25 January, and until then it was still the Rooster year that began on 5 February 1981.
That's why this calculator asks for the full date. It reads New Year from the Hong Kong Observatory's conversion tables, which cover 1901 to 2100.
The twelve animals
The twelve animalsstringmash.com/chinese-zodiac-calculator
Animal, element, yin and yang
The twelve animals come round in order: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog, Pig. Alongside them run the ten heavenly stems, which pair up into five elements, Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal and Water, each held for two years, the first yang and the second yin. An animal meets every element once in 60 years, and that 60-year cycle is the sexagenary cycle, used in China to name years for more than two thousand years.
Each year has a two-part name, a stem and a branch. 1984 was Jia-zi, the first year of a cycle, a Wood Rat. 2043 will be Gui-hai, the sixtieth, a Water Pig, and 2044 starts again with Jia-zi.
Chinese zodiac years, 1924 to 2043
Chinese zodiac years, 1924 to 2043stringmash.com/chinese-zodiac-calculator
Matches and clashes
Tradition groups the animals in four trines, sets of three animals four years apart that are said to get on: Rat, Dragon and Monkey; Ox, Snake and Rooster; Tiger, Horse and Dog; Rabbit, Goat and Pig. It also pairs them in six harmonies, Rat with Ox, Tiger with Pig, Rabbit with Dog, Dragon with Rooster, Snake with Monkey and Horse with Goat. The animal six years away, opposite on the wheel, is the clash.
This is folklore, offered for fun and for conversation at a New Year dinner, not as advice about anyone you know.
The same animals elsewhere
The animals are used across East Asia, with small changes. The Japanese zodiac has a sheep where the Chinese has a goat, and a wild boar for the pig, and since 1873 Japan has counted the year from 1 January. In Thailand the zodiac year can turn in April, at the Songkran new year.
Questions
What is my Chinese zodiac sign?
Type your birth date above. If you were born in January or February, the date matters, because Chinese New Year can fall as late as 20 February.
What is the Chinese zodiac for 2026?
The Fire Horse. The Horse year began on 17 February 2026 and runs to 5 February 2027.
What does my element mean?
The element comes from the year's heavenly stem and changes every two years: Wood, Fire, Earth, Metal, Water. It makes each animal year distinct across a 60-year cycle, so a 1966 Horse is Fire and a 1990 Horse is Metal.
Should the year start at New Year or at the start of spring?
Most people use Chinese New Year. Some astrologers use the start of spring, around 4 February, because it's a fixed point in the solar year. Change Year starts at to see both.
Sources
- Hong Kong Observatory: Gregorian–Lunar Calendar Conversion Tables
- Wikipedia: Chinese zodiac
- Wikipedia: Sexagenary cycle
- Wikipedia: Chinese New Year
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