Lunar New Year symbols

About lunar New Year symbols

Lunar New Year symbols are the customs of the new year that begins with the second new moon after the winter solstice, in late January or February. In 2027 it falls on Saturday 6 February, the first day of the first lunar month in the Hong Kong Observatory’s calendar, and begins the Ding-wei year, the Year of the Goat. Ding is one of the two fire stems of the sixty-year cycle, which makes it a Fire Goat year (see the five elements). The season runs for fifteen days, to the Lantern Festival on 20 February.

There are five pages. The red envelope, hongbao or lai see, is the packet of lucky money elders give children. The upside-down fu is the character for good fortune pasted upside down, a pun on “arrived”. The lion dance is the two-person lion that visits homes and shops, which is not the many-person dragon dance. Red lanterns light the season to its end at the Lantern Festival, Yuanxiao. And Firecrackers are the bamboo crackers of the oldest New Year records, with the much later legend of the monster Nian.

One new year, many names

The festival is kept across East and Southeast Asia and far beyond, each country by its own name and customs. In China it is the Spring Festival, which UNESCO inscribed on its Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity in 2024. In Vietnam it is Tết Nguyên Đán, with offerings to Ông Táo, the Kitchen God, and the cây nêu, a tall bamboo pole hung with decorations; the Vietnamese zodiac has the buffalo, the cat and the goat in place of the ox, the hare and the sheep. In Korea it is Seollal, with the sebae bow to elders, rice-cake soup (tteokguk) and the stick game yut. Chinese families in Singapore keep the season to its 15th night, Chap Goh Meh. In the United States, which has an estimated 5.4 million people of Chinese descent, 2 million Korean Americans and 2.3 million Vietnamese Americans, California, Colorado and New Jersey have made it a state holiday.

The customs on these pages change as they travel. New Year money is lì xì in Vietnam and ang bao, from the Hokkien, in Singapore, and in Korea it may come in a white envelope, not a red one.

The zodiac year

Each Lunar New Year starts a new animal year of the Chinese zodiac. The Year of the Horse began on 17 February 2026, and the Goat follows it on 6 February 2027.