Zodiac Cycle Calculator

Enter a birth year to find its Chinese zodiac animal and every other year — 12 years apart — that shares the same animal, with the current age for each.

Enter a birth year to get started.

About the 12-year zodiac cycle

The Chinese zodiac assigns one of 12 animals to each year in a repeating 12-year cycle, so anyone born exactly 12, 24, 36 (or any multiple of 12) years apart shares the same zodiac animal — a relationship Korean calls "tti-dong-gap" (same-animal-year peers). This tool figures out your zodiac animal from your birth year and lists the nearest matching years within a 60-year span, along with each match's age relationship to you.

How zodiac years and matches are calculated

The animal for a given year is determined by that year's position in the fixed 12-animal cycle (rat, ox, tiger, and so on), calculated from the year number itself. Since the cycle repeats every 12 years, the tool simply lists every year within ±60 years of your birth year that falls on the same position in the cycle, then labels whether each match is older or younger than you based on the calculated age difference.

Frequently asked questions

Does this use the lunar new year cutoff for people born in January or February?
No — this tool uses the Gregorian birth year as entered, a common simplification for web-based zodiac tools, rather than adjusting for the lunar calendar's new year date (which can fall anywhere from late January to mid-February). If you were born very close to the lunar new year, your traditionally recognized zodiac animal might differ from this calculation.
Why does the list only go out to ±60 years?
60 years (5 full cycles of 12) covers the realistic range of people who might be alive at the same time and share your zodiac animal, from young children to people in their 80s or 90s relative to your own birth year, without listing an unbounded number of matches.
Is having the same zodiac animal considered meaningful in Korean culture?
Sharing the same zodiac animal (tti) is often noted informally as a fun icebreaker or conversation point, especially between people of a similar generation, though it isn't treated as having any real predictive or compatibility significance beyond that casual social use.