Enter your birth date, time and place above. NatalChart.AI finds the exact moment the Sun returns to the longitude it had when you were born, calculates the full chart of that moment, and reads the year across six areas of life, from one return to the next. You choose the place the chart is cast for: your birthplace, or another place such as where you live now. The result is a map of where the year puts its emphasis. It is not a calendar of events. The positions come from the Swiss Ephemeris; the settings are on the verification page.
The moment of the return
The return is a moment, not a day. For the published test chart, born at 1991-09-06 15:30 UTC, the 2027 return is at 6 September 2027, 08:29:55 UTC. It does not repeat the clock time of birth, and it does not have to fall on the birthday: the Sun takes about 365 days, 5 hours and 49 minutes to come back to the same longitude, so the moment slides roughly six hours later every year and steps back in a leap year.
Demonstration birth: 1991-09-06 at 18:30 local time, Kyiv, Ukraine (50.4501° N, 30.5234° E), Europe/Kyiv at UTC+3, so 1991-09-06 15:30 UTC. Tropical zodiac, Placidus houses, Swiss Ephemeris 2.10.03. Full result and settings on How to verify your birth chart.
Two places, two sets of houses
At the moment of the return the Sun and the planets are where they are for everyone. What depends on the place is the Ascendant, the Midheaven and the twelve houses, and with them which area of life each planet falls in.
- Birthplace. The default. It keeps the return in the frame of the natal chart, and it is what you get if you choose nothing.
- Another place. Where you live now, or where you will be on the day. Same planets, different angles and houses, so a different emphasis for the year.
Astrologers use both, and there is no calculation that settles which is right. The product shows you what each gives and leaves the choice to you; how a place changes a chart is explained on relocation.
What the reading covers
- The Ascendant and the houses of the return chart: which areas of life the year brings forward.
- Planets on the angles of the return chart, with their orbs.
- How the return chart touches the natal one: the major aspects between the two, with orbs.
- Six sphere scores from 1 to 10, for Identity, Love, Body, Money, Home and Mind, each with the contacts behind it.
Where the method stops
A solar return is a map of emphasis for a year. It can say that the year leans towards work or towards home, that one planet is unusually prominent, that a theme of the natal chart is touched. It cannot say what will happen or when, and a high or low score is not a good or a bad year. Read it as a set of questions the year is likely to ask, and answer them on practical grounds.
Questions
What is a solar return chart?
The chart of the exact moment the Sun comes back to the longitude it had at your birth. That happens once a year, close to your birthday, and the chart of that moment is read as a description of the year that follows, until the next return.
Why is the return not at the time I was born, or even on my birthday?
Because the year is not a whole number of days. The Sun needs about 365 days, 5 hours and 49 minutes to come back to the same longitude, so the moment slides about six hours later each year and jumps back in a leap year. Depending on the year and your time zone it can fall on the day before or after the calendar birthday.
Which place is the chart cast for?
Your birthplace, unless you choose another place, for example where you live now or where you will be on the day. The Sun and the planets are the same in both. The Ascendant, the Midheaven and the houses are not, so the two charts put the year's emphasis in different areas of life. Astrologers disagree about which to use, and the product leaves the choice to you.
How is it calculated?
Swiss Ephemeris searches for the moment the Sun's longitude equals the natal one and returns it to the second. A full chart is then calculated for that moment and the chosen place: 17 bodies and points, Placidus houses, the five major aspects. It needs a birth time; without one the natal Sun is uncertain by about half a degree, which moves the return by about twelve hours.
Will it tell me what happens this year?
No. It shows where the year's emphasis falls: which houses are occupied, which planets are on the angles, how the return chart touches your natal one. That is a map of themes to think with. It is not a schedule of events, and nothing in it is a forecast.
How is it different from transits?
Transits follow the moving sky against your natal chart day by day. A solar return is one fixed chart for the whole year. They answer different questions: transits say what is active now, the return says what the year is about.
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