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Only 19% of birthdays keep the same sign in Vedic astrology

Everyone in this field repeats that your sign shifts back by about one when you move from Western to Vedic astrology. Nobody says how often, or by how much, or which signs are worst affected. So we calculated it for every day of the year.

80.8%of birthdays produce a different sign in Vedic astrology than in Western

The finding

Of the 365 days in 2026:

The agreement is not scattered randomly. Each sign has a single window of five or six consecutive days, always at the end of the Western sign's range, where the two systems line up. Outside that window, the Vedic sign is the previous one.

The full data, by sign

Western signDaysUsually becomesDaysDays agreeingAgreement window
Aries30Pisces24614–19 Apr
Taurus31Aries25615–20 May
Gemini31Taurus25615–20 Jun
Cancer32Gemini26617–22 Jul
Leo31Cancer25617–22 Aug
Virgo31Leo25617–22 Sep
Libra30Virgo25518–22 Oct
Scorpio30Libra25517–21 Nov
Sagittarius30Scorpio24616–21 Dec
Capricorn29Sagittarius23614–19 Jan
Aquarius30Capricorn24613–18 Feb
Pisces30Aquarius24615–20 Mar

Libra and Scorpio are the least likely to keep their sign, agreeing on only five days each, 16.7 percent. Capricorn is the most likely at 20.7 percent, and even that is barely one birthday in five.

Method

Stated in full so the result can be checked rather than taken on faith.

  1. For each of the 365 days of 2026, a chart was computed for 12:00 UTC at 51.51°N, 0.13°W. The Sun's sign changes with the date, not meaningfully with the location, so a single reference point is sufficient.
  2. The tropical Sun sign was taken from the standard seasonal boundaries.
  3. The sidereal Sun sign was computed from JPL DE421 ephemeris positions with the True Chitra Paksha ayanamsa applied.
  4. The two were compared per day and tallied.

Boundary days are the only source of ambiguity: a person born within a few hours of a sign change may fall either side of it, and only a full birth-time calculation settles that. This affects roughly one day per boundary, so the 80.8 percent figure carries an uncertainty of about a percentage point.

The ayanamsa matters. A different ayanamsa moves every boundary by a fraction of a degree and would change the totals slightly. Ours is stated on the methodology page.

Why this happens

Western astrology measures the zodiac from the spring equinox, so it is tied to the seasons. Vedic astrology measures from the fixed stars. Those two starting points coincided roughly two thousand years ago, and the slow wobble of the Earth's axis — precession — has since opened a gap of about 24 degrees.

A sign is 30 degrees wide. A 24-degree gap therefore leaves only about 6 degrees of overlap, which is the five-or-six-day window in the table. The full explanation is on Vedic vs Western astrology.

Citing this

The data is free to reuse with attribution (CC BY 4.0). Suggested citation:

The True Sign (2026). "Only 19% of birthdays keep the same sign in Vedic astrology." https://thetruesign.com/sign-shift/

Want to know which side of the line your own birthday falls on?

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Common questions

What percentage of people have a different Vedic sign?

80.8 percent. Of the 365 days in 2026, 295 produce a sidereal Sun sign different from the tropical one used in Western astrology. Only 70 days, 19.2 percent, give the same sign in both.

Why do the signs differ at all?

The two systems measure the zodiac from different starting points. Western astrology counts from the spring equinox; Vedic astrology counts from the fixed stars. Precession has opened a gap of about 24 degrees between them, which is most of a 30-degree sign.

Which signs are least likely to stay the same?

Libra and Scorpio. Each keeps its sign on only 5 days of the year, 16.7 percent, against 6 days for most others.

Does this apply to the Moon sign too?

The same 24-degree shift applies to every body in the chart, including the Moon. This study measures the Sun because that is the sign most people mean when they name theirs.

An honest note

This page reports an astronomical calculation, and that part is checkable. It does not argue that either system is more accurate — they measure from different reference points and both report the sky correctly from their own. Astrology itself is offered here for reflection, not as prediction or advice.