Sun sign calculator
What Zodiac Sign Am I?
Enter your birth date and get your answer right away. The year matters more than most people think: the Sun doesn't change signs on the same day every year, so the dates in magazine tables drift. We compute where the Sun actually was on your day, in your year.
Why the zodiac dates shift from year to year
A calendar year is 365 days, but the Earth takes about 365 and a quarter days to go around the Sun. Every ordinary year, the Sun reaches each sign boundary roughly six hours later than it did the year before. After four years the drift adds up to nearly a full day, then a leap year pulls everything back. The result is a slow wobble: the Sun might enter Taurus on April 19 one year and April 20 the next, and the same shifting happens at every boundary, in some years even sliding onto a third date. A printed table has to pick one date and stick with it, which is why two people with the same birthday can read two different answers. This calculator skips the table entirely. It computes the Sun's position for your specific date and year, so a birthday on the boundary gets the answer the sky actually gave.
The exact dates of every sign
These ranges cover the years 1940 to 2030, which is why some boundaries show two or three possible days. The calculator above doesn't guess between them; it computes the exact day for your year. (UTC)
Aries
The Sun enters on March 20–21Taurus
The Sun enters on April 19–20Gemini
The Sun enters on May 20–21Cancer
The Sun enters on June 20–22Leo
The Sun enters on July 22–23Virgo
The Sun enters on August 22–24Libra
The Sun enters on September 22–23Scorpio
The Sun enters on October 22–24Sagittarius
The Sun enters on November 21–23Capricorn
The Sun enters on December 21–22Aquarius
The Sun enters on January 19–21Pisces
The Sun enters on February 18–19Born on the edge? About 'cusps'
If you were born within a day or two of a sign boundary, you've probably heard that you're 'on the cusp', part one sign and part the next. It's a popular idea, and plenty of thoughtful people hold it. The astronomy is stricter, though: at any given moment, the Sun occupies exactly one sign. There is a precise instant when it crosses the boundary, and you were born on one side of that instant. You have one Sun sign. So why do so many cusp-born people genuinely feel like a mix? Often because something else is doing the blending. Mercury and Venus always travel close to the Sun, and one of them frequently sits in the neighboring sign. A Taurus Sun with Mercury in Aries really will notice some Aries in the way they think; that flavor just isn't coming from the Sun. If your birthday falls on a boundary day, the practical fix is simple: run the calculator above, add your birth time if you know it, and read the portrait that matches the answer.
Common questions
Why does this calculator show a different sign than a magazine table?
Printed tables use one fixed date range for every year, but the Sun doesn't cross sign boundaries on the same day each year. If you were born on or near a boundary, a generic table can land on the wrong side. We compute the Sun's actual position for your specific date and year.
Does my birth time matter?
Only if you were born on the exact day the Sun changed signs in your year. On that one day, the hour decides which side of the crossing you're on. Every other day of the year, the date alone gives a definite answer, so feel free to leave the time blank.
Why don't you ask for my city?
Because your Sun sign doesn't depend on where you were born. The Sun's position along the zodiac is the same for everyone on Earth at any given moment. Location matters for other parts of astrology, like your rising sign, but for this question your date and year are enough.
What does it mean to be born 'on the cusp'?
It means your birthday falls within a day or so of a sign boundary. Even then, the Sun occupied exactly one sign at the moment you were born, so one of the two is yours. The blended feeling many people describe usually traces back to Mercury or Venus sitting in the neighboring sign.
How accurate is the calculation?
We compute the Sun's apparent longitude with standard astronomical algorithms, the same math used for equinoxes and solstices, and we've verified the results against them. Crossing times are shown as 'around' a given hour because they're accurate to about a quarter of an hour. That settles almost every birth; when yours falls closer to the crossing than that, we show you both candidates instead of guessing.
Positions are computed with Swiss Ephemeris; the interpretation is editorial. How we work