Chinese zodiac
Dragon
Dragon — Chen, the 5th of the twelve earthly branches. It comes round every twelve years, each time with the next of the five elements, so the same animal and element meet again every sixty years.
The Chinese dragon, the long, is not the dragon of European stories: it brings rain, belongs with water rather than fire, and was for centuries the emblem of the emperor. It is also the year many families most want a child born in, and demographers have measured the effect since 1976: more births in Dragon years among Chinese families in Taiwan, Hong Kong, Singapore and Malaysia, though not in mainland China in 1976 or 1988.
The Dragon's earthly branch
The branch, Chen (辰), is older than the Dragon and names more than a year: it is also one of the twelve double hours of the traditional day, a month of the Chinese solar year and a point of the compass.
- Branch
- Chen 辰The 5th of twelve. The animal is written 龙.
- Polarity
- YangPaired only with the yang stems, so every Dragon year starts in an even-numbered calendar year.
- Element of the branch
- EarthThe Dragon's own, the same every year. The element in the table below belongs to the year.
- Double hour
- 07:00–09:00Read today off the local clock. Traditionally kept by the sun, so noon fell in the middle of the Horse's double hour.
- Solar month opens
- 5 April 2026At Qingming, Clear and Bright, when the sun reaches 15°. Beijing time, that has been 4, 5 or 6 April in every year from 1920 to 2026.
- Bearing
- 120°Between east and south, counting clockwise from the Rat at due north.
- Triad
- Rat, Dragon, MonkeyThe three branches four apart, which the tradition groups under Water.
- Opposite
- DogSix places on: the opposite hour, month and bearing.
The hours, bearings, triads and branch elements are the standard correspondences of the earthly branches. The month dates are worked out here from the sun's position, on the Beijing calendar, for every year from 1920 to 2026. What the solar terms are →
A January or early-February birthday can belong to the year before
The Year of the Dragon does not begin on 1 January. In 2024 it began on 10 February. A baby born on 1 January 2024 — before that date — would be a Rabbit, not a Dragon.
The new year falls between 21 January and 20 February, and until it arrives the previous animal is still in charge. Each year's own date is in the table below.
Every year of the Dragon since 1920
| Year | Began on | Element |
|---|---|---|
| 1928 | 23 January | Earth Dragon |
| 1940 | 8 February | Metal Dragon |
| 1952 | 27 January | Water Dragon |
| 1964 | 13 February | Wood Dragon |
| 1976 | 31 January | Fire Dragon |
| 1988 | 17 February | Earth Dragon |
| 2000 | 5 February | Metal Dragon |
| 2012 | 23 January | Water Dragon |
| 2024 | 10 February | Wood Dragon |
The animal repeats every twelve years; the element repeats every ten, so the same pairing — such as Wood Dragon — is sixty years apart.