What Chinese Zodiac Is 2025? Year of the Wood Snake

2025 Lunar New Year: start and end dates

Lunar New Year opened the Wood Snake year on January 29, 2025, and the year ran to February 16, 2026. So a birth date of Jan 29, 2025 or later counts as Wood Snake, and so do early 2026 birthdays through Feb 16; births in 2025 before Jan 29 still belong to the Wood Dragon. That moving boundary comes from the lunisolar calendar, in which the new year starts with the second new moon after the winter solstice in most years, so its Gregorian date shifts by up to a month from one year to the next. Look sixty years either side and the pairing repeats: 1965 are Wood Snake years too. That Wednesday new year arrived with the Sun in Aquarius in the Western zodiac.

What the Wood Snake is like

A Snake that opens up a little is the classic image of this year. Since Wood generates Fire, readings describe steady confidence, strong intuition and a generous, creative streak. Those born now often make excellent mentors. Setting dates for decisions and expressing warmth directly, not just through subtle gestures, help others understand them. Libraries, galleries and well-tended gardens often bring them peace and fresh ideas.

In the five-element scheme, Wood belongs to the east and to the green energy of early spring, and that seasonal image shapes how it colours an animal sign. A Wood stem tends to soften sharp edges and add warmth, curiosity and a cooperative instinct. Traditional texts associate it with benevolence, growth and the wish to build something that lasts beyond the self. People born under a Wood stem are often portrayed as principled, open-handed and hopeful about others. The caution usually attached to Wood is a habit of spreading energy thinly, saying yes to every request and feeling quietly hurt when generosity is not returned in kind.

2025 in the animal cycle and in numerology

In numerology the year reduces to 9, the number of completion, generosity and letting go, and a 9 year is traditionally read as one of endings that clear space. The digits of 2025 add up to 9. The Snake holds the sixth place among the twelve animals and its fixed element is Fire. Set beside the year's Wood stem, wood generates Fire, which readings use to describe how settled or stretched the combination feels. The year before was the Wood Dragon and the year after is the Fire Horse.

Chinese almanacs name 2025 Yi-Si, pairing the Wood stem Yi with the branch Si. Both are Yin, as stem and branch always share a polarity, so of the hundred and twenty possible pairings only sixty ever occur, and each one names a single year in every cycle.