Chinese zodiac
2027 Chinese zodiac animal, the Year of the Fire Goat
Leon·Updated November 10, 2026·5 min2027 is the Year of the Goat. It starts on Saturday 6 February 2027, Chinese New Year, and ends on Tuesday 25 January 2028.
In Chinese it is , and more exactly , a fire goat year. The animal before it is the horse, and the one after it is the monkey.
We publish stories from China in Dengdeng, our reading app, from Beginner to Hard. Tap a Chinese word here for its pinyin and meaning, and play its audio.
Goat, sheep or ram
covers all three animals, so English uses all three names for the year. In Chinese you only add a word when you need to be exact: is a goat and is a sheep. The Year of the Goat page has more words with .
Why "fire goat"
The two characters of come from two old counting systems.
is the eighth of the twelve , the "earthly branches", and it belongs to the goat. is the fourth of the ten , the "heavenly stems", and it belongs to fire.
Twelve animals and five elements make a cycle of sixty years. The last fire goat year was 1967, and the next one is 2087.
| Year | Name | Element |
|---|---|---|
| 1967 | Fire | |
| 1979 | Earth | |
| 1991 | Metal | |
| 2003 | Water | |
| 2015 | Wood | |
| 2027 | Fire |
If you were born in a goat year
2027 is your , the year your own animal comes back. You were born in a goat year if your birthday falls in one of these periods:
- 15 February 1991 to 3 February 1992
- 1 February 2003 to 21 January 2004
- 19 February 2015 to 7 February 2016
The full list back to 1931 is on the goat page. The zodiac lookup works it out from your birth date.
Tradition says the is a year to be careful in, and red keeps the bad luck away. So in 2027, goats wear red socks, red underwear or a red string on the wrist, often a gift from a parent.
An old saying about goat babies
There is an old saying, : "of ten goats, nine are not whole". It claims that people born in goat years have hard lives.
One explanation is that goats are meek animals that end up on the table. Most people now call the saying nonsense, but some families still bring it up when they plan a baby.
The holiday
Chinese New Year's Eve is Friday 5 February 2027, and the official holiday runs from 5 to 13 February. Our Chinese New Year guide has the dates from Little Year to the Lantern Festival, and the greetings page has the wishes and the goat-year puns, such as .
The plain goat-year wish is , "great luck in the year of the goat".
Common questions
When does the Year of the Goat start in 2027?
On Saturday 6 February 2027, Chinese New Year. It ends on Tuesday 25 January 2028.
What element is 2027?
Fire. 2027 is , a fire goat year. The last fire goat year was 1967.
Is a baby born in January 2027 a goat?
No. A baby born before 6 February 2027 is a horse, because the horse year runs from 17 February 2026 to 5 February 2027.
What is the Chinese zodiac for 2028?
The monkey, from Wednesday 26 January 2028. 2028 is , an earth monkey year.
The dates on this page come from the open-source calendar library lunar-python, checked against the State Council holiday schedule.
For a Chinese story a day in the Year of the Goat, see today's edition. In the Dengdeng app, one story from each edition is free.
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