You came here to find your zodiac sign. The table below gives it to you. Then comes the part that almost no one prints.
Most sites show one fixed date range per zodiac sign. That range is a rounding. The Sun does not move by the calendar. It crosses into a new zodiac sign at a clock moment, and that moment shifts by more than a day from year to year. So the usual table is wrong for some people, and it cannot decide at all for others.
We checked it. We took the date table that Google served on its own results page, and we compared it against the real position of the Sun for every single day between the years 1940 and 2030. That is 33,238 days. The table named the wrong zodiac sign on 355 of them. That is close to 1 day in 94.
The Chinese zodiac has a bigger version of this problem: our guide to Chinese zodiac signs shows that a plain year table gives 3 in 5 January and February birthdays the wrong animal.
The 12 zodiac signs, with honest date ranges
Here is the whole zodiac, written the way the sky actually works. Each start date is a range, because the Sun arrives on a different calendar day in different years.
| Name of the zodiac sign | The Sun enters this sign on | The Sun leaves this sign on | Element of this sign |
|---|---|---|---|
| Aries | March 20 or 21 | April 19 or 20 | Fire. |
| Taurus | April 19 or 20 | May 20 or 21 | Earth. |
| Gemini | May 20 or 21 | June 20, 21 or 22 | Air. |
| Cancer | June 20, 21 or 22 | July 22 or 23 | Water. |
| Leo | July 22 or 23 | August 22, 23 or 24 | Fire. |
| Virgo | August 22, 23 or 24 | September 22 or 23 | Earth. |
| Libra | September 22 or 23 | October 22, 23 or 24 | Air. |
| Scorpio | October 22, 23 or 24 | November 21, 22 or 23 | Water. |
| Sagittarius | November 21, 22 or 23 | December 21 or 22 | Fire. |
| Capricorn | December 21 or 22 | January 19, 20 or 21 | Earth. |
| Aquarius | January 19, 20 or 21 | February 18 or 19 | Air. |
| Pisces | February 18 or 19 | March 20 or 21 | Water. |
If your birthday sits in the middle of a range, you are safe. Read your sign below and move on. If your birthday sits on one of the edge days, keep reading. The next section was written for you.
The 12 birth dates where the usual table gets it wrong
Some birth dates are a coin toss. The Sun crosses the line on those days, and the hour decides the answer. Here is how the common table performs on each of those dates, across the 91 years we checked.
| If you were born on this date | The common table calls you | You were really born under | Share of years the table is wrong |
|---|---|---|---|
| October 23 | Scorpio | Libra | 59 percent. |
| June 21 | Cancer | Gemini | 57 percent. |
| January 20 | Aquarius | Capricorn | 49 percent. |
| November 22 | Sagittarius | Scorpio | 48 percent. |
| August 23 | Virgo | Leo | 31 percent. |
| April 20 | Taurus | Aries | 26 percent. |
| May 21 | Gemini | Taurus | 23 percent. |
| September 23 | Libra | Virgo | 22 percent. |
| March 20 | Pisces | Aries | 22 percent. |
| February 19 | Pisces | Aquarius | 13 percent. |
| July 23 | Leo | Cancer | 10 percent. |
| December 22 | Capricorn | Sagittarius | 9 percent. |
Read the first row again. If you were born on October 23, the usual table calls you a Scorpio. In 54 of the 91 years we checked, you were a Libra. That is not a rare edge case. That is more than half.
Five more dates flip in rarer years: July 22, December 21, February 18, March 21 and September 22. The last two are wrong in only 1 year out of 91. The error runs both ways. On March 20 the table is late and calls you a Pisces when the Sun had already moved into Aries.
If your birthday is on this list, do not guess and do not split the difference. There is no such thing as being half one sign and half the next. The Sun was in one sign at the minute you were born. You need the hour and the place, and then the answer is exact.
It matters for couples too, since a pair born the same week in late August can look like a case of Leo and Virgo compatibility and turn out to share one sign.
The same problem of two methods giving two answers hits another chart point, and our guide to Black Moon Lilith measures how far the two disagree.
How we measured this, in plain words
We used an ephemeris. An ephemeris is a table of where each body in the sky sits at a given moment, worked out from the laws of motion. We asked it one question, once per day, for 33,238 days in a row: where was the Sun?
Then we compared that answer to the printed date table. Two numbers came out of it.
The first number is 355. That is the count of days where the printed table names a zodiac sign that the Sun was not in. It is 1.07 percent of all days.
The second number is larger, and it matters more. On 1,092 days, the Sun changed zodiac sign during the day itself. That is 3.29 percent of all days, or about 1 day in 30. On those days no date table can be right or wrong, because there is no single answer for the whole day. The answer depends on the hour of birth.
One point of method, stated plainly. We judged each day by where the Sun stood at midday, measured in universal time. A person born at six in the morning in Los Angeles and a person born at eleven at night in Tokyo share a birth date and can hold two different zodiac signs. That is not a flaw in the measurement. That is the whole point. A date on its own cannot settle the question, and our method makes the gap visible instead of hiding it.
Why the dates move at all
The reason is simple arithmetic. A year is not a whole number of days. The Earth takes about 365 and a quarter days to go around the Sun. Our calendar holds 365 days and then catches up with a leap day.
So the Sun arrives at the start of Aries about six hours later each year. After three years it has drifted almost a day. The leap day pulls it back. The result is a saw tooth: the moment creeps forward, then jumps back.
We measured that spread. Across the 91 years, the moment the Sun enters a given zodiac sign moves through a window of 33 to 36 hours. A window that wide covers two calendar dates for most signs. For Cancer, Virgo, Scorpio, Sagittarius and Aquarius it covers three.
That is why we print ranges and not borders. A border implies a fact that the sky does not supply.
The four elements: fire, earth, air and water
The twelve signs sort into four groups of three. Each group shares a base temperament. This grouping is old, and it runs through the whole tradition.
Fire signs are Aries, Leo and Sagittarius. The tradition reads them as direct, warm and quick to start things.
Earth signs are Taurus, Virgo and Capricorn. They are read as steady, practical and slow to waste effort.
Air signs are Gemini, Libra and Aquarius. They are read as verbal, social and driven by ideas.
Water signs are Cancer, Scorpio and Pisces. They are read as feeling first, private and hard to rush.
We wrote a longer piece on the four astrological elements and how each one colours the signs it holds.
The three modalities: how a sign moves
The second sorting cuts the twelve a different way, into three groups of four. Where the element says what a sign is made of, this one says how it acts.
Cardinal signs open a season: Aries, Cancer, Libra and Capricorn. The tradition reads them as starters.
Fixed signs sit in the middle of a season: Taurus, Leo, Scorpio and Aquarius. They are read as holders.
Mutable signs close a season: Gemini, Virgo, Sagittarius and Pisces. They are read as adapters.
Every zodiac sign is one element and one modality, and no pair repeats. That is the whole design. Our guide to the three astrological modalities works through all twelve pairs.
The 12 zodiac signs, one by one
Each sign below gets a line and a door. Walk through the door for the full reading.
The first sign of the zodiac is Aries, which opens the year at the spring equinox and is read as the drive to begin.
Next comes Taurus, the first earth sign, read as the wish to build something that lasts and to enjoy it.
Then Gemini, the first air sign, read as the mind that gathers, sorts and passes on what it hears.
The fourth sign is Cancer, the first water sign, read as the pull toward home, memory and the people you protect.
At the height of summer sits Leo, read as the warmth that wants to be seen and the will to hold the centre.
Then Virgo, read as the eye for the small flaw and the wish to make a thing work properly.
The autumn equinox brings Libra, read as the search for balance and the weighing of one person against another.
Next is Scorpio, read as the appetite for what lies under the surface and for what people hide.
Then Sagittarius, read as the reach past the known edge, in travel, belief or study.
At the winter solstice comes Capricorn, read as the long climb and the patience that a long climb asks for.
Then Aquarius, read as the step back from the group in order to see the group clearly.
The zodiac closes with Pisces, read as the soft edge where one thing runs into the next.
What your Sun sign does not tell you
Here is the honest limit of everything above. Your zodiac sign is your Sun sign. The Sun is one body out of ten that a full reading uses.
Picture a house with twelve rooms. Each room covers one area of life: money, work, home, love. The planets are the furniture. Knowing your zodiac sign tells you which room holds one single chair. It says nothing about the other nine pieces, and nothing about which room the front door opens into.
Two of those pieces matter most, and both need your birth hour.
The first is the Moon, which the tradition ties to feeling and to what soothes you. The Moon moves fast. It changes sign every two and a half days. When a chart is built with no birth time, the software guesses midday. We ran that guess against real charts, and a midday chart names the wrong Moon sign for about one person in nine.
The second is the rising sign, also called the ascendant. It is the degree of the zodiac climbing over the horizon at your birth. It moves one degree every four minutes. Without a birth time there is no answer at all, only a guess. Our guide to the ascendant and your rising sign explains what it changes.
Our guide to birth chart compatibility shows what a date can and cannot fix when you compare two people.
The rising sign is what sets the twelve rooms in place. Read more on the twelve astrological houses and on the role the Sun plays in a chart.
What about Ophiuchus, the 13th sign?
This question comes back every few years, and the honest answer is short. Ophiuchus is a real constellation. The Sun does pass in front of it. It is not a 13th zodiac sign, and nothing has been hidden from you.
The reason sits in what the zodiac is. Western astrology uses the tropical zodiac. That system starts at the spring equinox and cuts the year into twelve equal arcs of 30 degrees each. The arcs are named after constellations. They are not the constellations.
The constellations are uneven. Some are wide, some are narrow, and their borders were fixed by astronomers in 1930 for mapping the sky. The zodiac was never a map of star groups. It has been a division of the seasonal year since it was written down.
There is a second system, the sidereal zodiac, which does track the constellations and is used across Indian astrology. It gives different results, and it knows why. We compare the two in our guide to the tropical and sidereal zodiac systems.
Where the twelve signs come from
The twelve signs are old. The division of the sky into twelve parts goes back to Babylonian sky watchers.
The version the West inherited was set down by Claudius Ptolemy in Alexandria, around 150 AD, in a work called the Tetrabiblos. Ptolemy fixed the tropical zodiac to the equinox rather than to the stars. That single choice is why Ophiuchus is not a zodiac sign today.
Vettius Valens, writing in Greek in the same century, left the Anthology. It is a long collection of worked charts, and it shows the craft as it was practised rather than argued. Between the two of them, the structure you read in the table above was already in place eighteen centuries ago.
According to the tradition these authors handed down, a zodiac sign colours a planet placed in it. Astrology is not a science, and we will not dress it as one. It is a symbolic language with a long written record.
Zodiac signs by month, at a glance
Many people look for the zodiac by month rather than by exact date. Each month holds the tail of one sign and the head of the next. Here is that view.
| Month of birth | Sign that runs into this month | Sign that starts inside this month |
|---|---|---|
| January | Capricorn | Aquarius, from the 19th, 20th or 21st. |
| February | Aquarius | Pisces, from the 18th or 19th. |
| March | Pisces | Aries, from the 20th or 21st. |
| April | Aries | Taurus, from the 19th or 20th. |
| May | Taurus | Gemini, from the 20th or 21st. |
| June | Gemini | Cancer, from the 20th, 21st or 22nd. |
| July | Cancer | Leo, from the 22nd or 23rd. |
| August | Leo | Virgo, from the 22nd, 23rd or 24th. |
| September | Virgo | Libra, from the 22nd or 23rd. |
| October | Libra | Scorpio, from the 22nd, 23rd or 24th. |
| November | Scorpio | Sagittarius, from the 21st, 22nd or 23rd. |
| December | Sagittarius | Capricorn, from the 21st or 22nd. |
No month maps to one sign. That is why a birth month on its own never answers the question.
Frequently asked questions about zodiac signs
What are the dates of the 12 zodiac signs?
They are in the first table above. Each one is a range of two or three calendar days, because the Sun enters a sign at a different hour every year. Fixed single dates are a rounding, and that rounding is wrong on 355 days out of 33,238.
What are the 12 zodiac signs in order by month?
The order follows the year from the spring equinox. March brings Aries, April Taurus, May Gemini, June Cancer, July Leo, August Virgo, September Libra, October Scorpio, November Sagittarius, December Capricorn, January Aquarius and February Pisces. Each sign starts late in one month and runs into the next.
How do I know my zodiac sign if I was born on a cusp?
The word cusp means the line between two signs. A date alone will not settle it. You need your birth hour and your birth place, and then the Sun position is worked out exactly. On the twelve dates listed above, this is the only way to get a real answer.
Which zodiac sign is the luckiest in 2026?
No sign is luckier than another. That idea does not come from the tradition. What the tradition looks at is the movement of the slow planets against your own chart, which is personal and differs for two people born on the same day.
Which zodiac signs are soulmates?
The old rule pairs signs that share an element, and pairs fire with air and earth with water. It is a starting point and nothing more. A real compatibility reading compares two whole charts, and the Moon and the rising sign carry more weight there than the Sun.
That side-by-side comparison is called a synastry chart, and any two strangers already share about eight major aspects in one.
Venus adds the love-style layer. The page on Venus sign compatibility shows how two Sun signs set the odds for a Venus match.
Our guide to moon sign compatibility shows how often a birth date alone gets that Moon wrong.
The Moon has a phase as well, and our page on moon phase compatibility gives the odds that two birth phases make one full Moon.
Ptolemy even gave the fire group to the Sun and Jupiter, the rulers of two of its signs, a detail at the heart of Leo and Sagittarius compatibility.
Can two people born on the same day have different zodiac signs?
Yes, on 1,092 days out of the 33,238 we checked. On those days the Sun crosses into the next sign during the day itself. Birth hour and time zone decide the outcome.
Does my zodiac sign change over time?
No. Your birth chart is a snapshot of one moment and it does not move. The stars behind the signs do drift, which is what the sidereal system tracks, but your tropical Sun sign is fixed for life.
Get the answer for your own birth moment
A date table is a shortcut, and now you know what the shortcut costs. Your own chart costs nothing to be exact about, because your birth moment is a fact.
Astrovision builds that chart from your date, hour and place. You get a written guide and a personal audio podcast, made for your chart and no one else. It names your Sun sign with the hour taken into account, your Moon sign, your rising sign and the houses that hold them.
Start with your free daily horoscope, then go deeper with a complete natal chart reading whenever you want the full picture.