Life stages · Solar return
Solar return 2026: the second the Sun comes home
Every year the Sun returns to the exact degree it held when you were born. In 2026 that moment lands about 5 h 50 min later in the day than last year, and that small shift decides the whole chart.
Photo: Sarah Pflug / Burst
At a glance
Your solar return 2026 is the instant the Sun reaches your birth degree, about 5 h 50 min later in the day than in 2025.
- Example: Sun at 15° Scorpio
- Nov 7, 2026, 09:52 UTCNov 7, 2025, 04:04 UTC in 2025
- Average shift, 2025 to 2026
- +5 h 50 mincomputed for 12 sample birthdays
- Jupiter moves into Leo
- Jun 30, 2026the 2026 Jupiter return splits across Cancer and Leo
- Saturn enters Aries
- Feb 14, 2026the slow backdrop to every 2026 return chart
The idea
Your birthday has a minute, and it moves
Try this today
- Find your exact 2026 return time with the finder below.
- Set an alarm for that minute and mark it, even quietly.
- Write three things you want from this solar year, birthday to birthday.
Blowing out candles is a lovely ritual. Astrology adds one more: the solar return, the exact moment the Sun gets back to the degree it occupied when you were born.
Cast a chart for that moment and you get your solar return chart, a snapshot astrologers read as the shape of the year ahead, birthday to birthday. The planets show the weather. The houses show where the weather lands.
The moment is never quite the same clock time. A year is about 365 and a quarter days, so each return falls later in the day than the one before, then jumps back after a leap day. That is why your return chart changes so much from year to year, even though the Sun is always in the same spot.
The drift
Why 2026 lands about 6 hours later than 2025
We computed the return for a Sun at 15° of each sign in 2025, 2026 and 2027 with the JPL DE442 ephemeris. From 2025 to 2026, every one moves later by between 5 h 48 min and 5 h 52 min.
Six hours is a quarter of a day. Because the Earth turns under the sky in that time, the return Ascendant moves by about three signs, and the Sun usually moves back by about three houses.
So if 2025 put your return Sun in the 10th house, 2026 often puts it near the 7th. Same Sun, completely different year. The table near the bottom of this page has all twelve examples.
The sky behind it
Method: skyfield with JPL DE442, geocentric apparent longitude, true equinox of date (tropical zodiac), UTC. The drift depends on the exact tropical year and small perturbations, so it varies by a few minutes with the season.
Reading it
Start with the house your return Sun lands in
Try this today
- Read the page for your return Sun's house.
- Then read the house opposite: it is often where the year pulls back.
The house holding your return Sun is the headline of the year. Each one has its own page:
- 1st house: marks a self-led year: a new look, a new start, more visibility
- 2nd house: puts money, skills and self-worth at the centre of your year
- 3rd house: points your year at communication, learning, siblings and local travel
- 4th house: puts home, family and your private foundations at the centre of the year
- 5th house: points the year at romance, fun, creative work and children
- 6th house: puts daily work, routines and health habits at the centre of the year
- 7th house: makes partnerships, commitment and one-to-one deals the year's main theme
- 8th house: focuses the year on shared money, intimacy and deep personal change
- 9th house: points the year at travel, higher study, beliefs and publishing
- 10th house: puts career, reputation and public achievement at the top of the year
- 11th house: points the year at friendships, communities, networks and future goals
- 12th house: marks a quieter, inward year: rest, reflection and closing chapters
The house depends on the time of day of the return, which is why you need a birth time. With equal houses, a return just before sunrise puts the Sun in the 1st, around noon in the 10th, around sunset in the 7th and around midnight in the 4th.
Jupiter return 2026
The 2026 Jupiter return, across two signs
Try this today
- Check your natal Jupiter with the finder.
- Look back twelve years: what started for you then?
Jupiter takes about twelve years to circle the zodiac, so it returns to its birth position around ages 12, 24, 36, 48, 60 and 72. Astrologers read it as a growth checkpoint.
In 2026 Jupiter starts in Cancer, turns direct at 15°05′ Cancer on Mar 11, 2026, enters Leo on Jun 30, 2026 and stations retrograde at 27°01′ Leo on Dec 13, 2026. If your natal Jupiter sits anywhere from 15° to the end of Cancer, or from 0° Leo to about 27° Leo, you have a Jupiter return in 2026.
That covers people born while Jupiter was in late Cancer or Leo: roughly mid-2014 to mid-2015, 2002 to 2003, 1990 to 1991 and so on. The finder checks your exact degree and gives the dates, including any retrograde repeat. For the full lifetime list, use our Jupiter return calculator.
The 2026 sky
What every 2026 return chart has in common
Faster planets differ between return charts. The slow ones sit in the same signs for everybody, so they form the year's shared backdrop.
Neptune enters Aries on Jan 26, 2026. Saturn follows on Feb 14, 2026. Uranus settles into Gemini on Apr 26, 2026. Jupiter moves from Cancer into Leo on Jun 30, 2026, and Pluto stays in Aquarius all year.
Where those planets fall in your own return chart is personal. In Aries, Saturn and Neptune together are read as a call for new beginnings built with patience.
Your return
Find your 2026 solar return
Enter your birth details. The finder works out the exact second the Sun returns to its birth degree in 2026 (or 2027), the return Ascendant, which house the return Sun falls in, your return Moon, and whether 2026 is a Jupiter return year for you. It all runs in your browser.
Return year
More to read
Shorter reads. Each opens in place.
Good to know
Birthplace or where you are?
The planets in a return chart are the same anywhere on Earth. Only the Ascendant and houses change with location. Some astrologers cast for the birthplace, others for where you are on the day (a relocated return). Our finder casts for the place you enter, so enter where you will be if you prefer a relocated return.
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Another yearly lens
Solar returns and profection years
Hellenistic astrologers paired solar returns with annual profections, which move one house per year of age. If both point to the same house in 2026, many readers treat that house as doubly important. See profection years.
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The numbers
Computed with JPL DE442. Times in UTC.
| Natal Sun | 2025 return | 2026 return | Shift | 2027 return |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 15° Aries | Apr 4, 2025, 12:48 UTC | Apr 4, 2026, 18:39 UTC | +5 h 52 min | Apr 5, 2027, 00:17 UTC |
| 15° Taurus | May 5, 2025, 05:57 UTC | May 5, 2026, 11:48 UTC | +5 h 52 min | May 5, 2027, 17:25 UTC |
| 15° Gemini | Jun 5, 2025, 09:56 UTC | Jun 5, 2026, 15:48 UTC | +5 h 52 min | Jun 5, 2027, 21:25 UTC |
| 15° Cancer | Jul 6, 2025, 20:04 UTC | Jul 7, 2026, 01:56 UTC | +5 h 52 min | Jul 7, 2027, 07:37 UTC |
| 15° Leo | Aug 7, 2025, 05:51 UTC | Aug 7, 2026, 11:42 UTC | +5 h 51 min | Aug 7, 2027, 17:26 UTC |
| 15° Virgo | Sep 7, 2025, 08:51 UTC | Sep 7, 2026, 14:41 UTC | +5 h 49 min | Sep 7, 2027, 20:28 UTC |
| 15° Libra | Oct 8, 2025, 00:41 UTC | Oct 8, 2026, 06:29 UTC | +5 h 48 min | Oct 8, 2027, 12:17 UTC |
| 15° Scorpio | Nov 7, 2025, 04:04 UTC | Nov 7, 2026, 09:52 UTC | +5 h 48 min | Nov 7, 2027, 15:38 UTC |
| 15° Sagittarius | Dec 6, 2025, 21:04 UTC | Dec 7, 2026, 02:52 UTC | +5 h 48 min | Dec 7, 2027, 08:37 UTC |
| 15° Capricorn | Jan 5, 2025, 02:32 UTC | Jan 5, 2026, 08:23 UTC | +5 h 50 min | Jan 5, 2027, 14:09 UTC |
| 15° Aquarius | Feb 3, 2025, 14:10 UTC | Feb 3, 2026, 20:02 UTC | +5 h 52 min | Feb 4, 2027, 01:46 UTC |
| 15° Pisces | Mar 5, 2025, 08:07 UTC | Mar 5, 2026, 13:58 UTC | +5 h 52 min | Mar 5, 2027, 19:39 UTC |
| Planet | Moves | When (UTC) |
|---|---|---|
| Jupiter | Cancer to Leo | Jun 30, 2026, 05:52 UTC |
| Jupiter | Leo to Virgo | Jul 26, 2027, 04:49 UTC |
| Saturn | Pisces to Aries | Feb 14, 2026, 00:11 UTC |
| Uranus | Taurus to Gemini | Apr 26, 2026, 00:51 UTC |
| Neptune | Pisces to Aries | Jan 26, 2026, 17:34 UTC |
| Pluto | stays in Aquarius | all of 2026 and 2027 |
| Jupiter in Cancer | Jupiter in Leo |
|---|---|
| Jun 26, 2013 to Jul 16, 2014 | Jul 16, 2014 to Aug 11, 2015 |
| Jul 13, 2001 to Aug 1, 2002 | Aug 1, 2002 to Aug 27, 2003 |
| Jul 30, 1989 to Aug 18, 1990 | Aug 18, 1990 to Sep 12, 1991 |
| Feb 28, 1979 to Apr 20, 1979 | Apr 20, 1979 to Sep 29, 1979 |
| Apr 12, 1978 to Sep 5, 1978 | Sep 5, 1978 to Feb 28, 1979 |
| Aug 20, 1977 to Dec 30, 1977 | Feb 27, 1968 to Jun 15, 1968 |
All times are UTC. In the Americas the local date can be a day earlier; in Asia and Australia a day later.
Quick answers
When is my solar return 2026?
Within about a day of your 2026 birthday, at the exact moment the Sun returns to the degree and minute it held when you were born. Because a year is about 365.24 days, the moment falls roughly 5 h 50 min later in the day than your 2025 return. The finder on this page computes it to the minute.
Is my solar return on my birthday?
Usually, but not always. Depending on your birth time and time zone, the return can land the day before or the day after your calendar birthday.
How do I read my solar return chart 2026?
Start with the house the return Sun falls in: that is the year's main theme. Then look at the return Ascendant, the return Moon and any planets on the angles. Our twelve house pages walk through each Sun placement.
What does Sun in the 8th house solar return mean?
A year focused on shared money, debts, intimacy and deep personal change. It is intense, not bad. See the full 8th-house page for timing and ideas.
When is the Jupiter return in 2026?
If your natal Jupiter is between 15° and 30° Cancer, or between 0° and about 27° Leo, Jupiter crosses it in 2026. Jupiter leaves Cancer for Leo on Jun 30, 2026, 05:52 UTC. That covers most people born in the late-Cancer and Leo Jupiter years, aged about 12, 24, 36, 48, 60 and 72.
Should I use my birthplace or where I live for the solar return?
Both are used. Many astrologers cast the return for where you are on your birthday (a relocated return), others keep the birthplace. The planets stay the same; the Ascendant and houses change.
Can I use the 2027 solar return calculator now?
Yes. The finder switches between 2026 and 2027, and the 2027 page adds the 2027 sky and Jupiter return.
