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Glossary · The moving sky

The solar return

What it changes

The start of a full lap. Nothing magical: a marker, and the only one in the year that is yours alone.

What it is

The Sun returns to exactly the longitude it held at your birth. This is your astronomical birthday — usually within a day of the calendar one.

See the calculated example
00:0006:0012:0018:002016 · 2 January at 02:4320162017 · 1 January at 08:312018 · 1 January at 14:212019 · 1 January at 20:152020 · 2 January at 02:042021 · 1 January at 07:572022 · 1 January at 13:502023 · 1 January at 19:372024 · 2 January at 01:232025 · 1 January at 07:082026 · 1 January at 12:5520262027 · 1 January at 18:452028 · 2 January at 00:292029 · 1 January at 06:142030 · 1 January at 12:072031 · 1 January at 17:562032 · 1 January at 23:502033 · 1 January at 05:452034 · 1 January at 11:362035 · 1 January at 17:302035
Calculated example: for a birth on 1 January 1997 at noon (Paris), the Sun comes back to its birth degree every year, but not at the same time. Each dot is a return, from 2016 (centre) to 2035 (edge), on a 24-hour clock: the time moves on by about 5 h 50 min from one year to the next, the quarter of a day the solar year has on top of the calendar’s 365 days.

Calculated on the site

The seasons →

See also

The Saturn returnThe Jupiter return

Your Sun sign is only the start.

Your Moon, your rising sign, your planets: AstroXP calculates your full chart to the minute of your birth, and every morning the real sky on that chart.

My full chart

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