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Lunar New Year is the beginning of a new year based on lunar or lunisolar calendars, celebrated by various cultures across the world. Learn about the origins, customs and dates of Chinese New Year, Tibetan New Year, Korean New Year, Vietnamese New Year and more.
Learn about the history, symbols and customs of Chinese New Year, also known as Lunar New Year or Spring Festival. Find out when it falls in 2025, 2026 and 2027 and what activities and celebrations you can enjoy in Singapore.
Aug 21, 2024 · Lunar New Year, festival typically celebrated in China and other Asian countries that begins with the first new moon of the lunar calendar and ends on the first full moon of the lunar calendar, 15 days later.
- The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
- Overview
- What is the Lunar New Year?
- How Lunar New Year is celebrated
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Observed by billions of people, the festival also known as Chinese New Year or Spring Festival is marked by themes of reunion and hope.
Lanterns and light installations illuminate the city walls of Xi'an, China, during a rehearsal for its Spring Festival light show. Also known as Lunar New Year and Chinese New Year, the festival is celebrated throughout the world with family reunions and plenty of food.
Modern China actually uses a Gregorian calendar like most of the rest of the world. Its holidays, however, are governed by its traditional lunisolar calendar, which may have been in use from as early as the 21st century B.C. When the newly founded Republic of China officially adopted the Gregorian calendar in 1912, its leaders rebranded the observation of the Lunar New Year as Spring Festival, as it is known in China today.
(Learn why some people celebrate Christmas in January.)
As its name suggests, the date of the lunar new year depends on the phase of the moon and varies from year to year. Each year in the lunar calendar is named one of the 12 animals in the Chinese zodiac, which are derived from ancient Chinese folklore. Repeating in a rotating basis, these animals are the rat, ox, tiger, rabbit, dragon, snake, horse, goat, monkey, rooster, dog, and pig.
Today, Spring Festival is celebrated in China and Hong Kong; Lunar New Year is also celebrated in South Korea, Tibet, Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia, Malaysia, and places with large Chinese populations. Though the festival varies by country, it is dominated by themes of reunion and hope.
For Chinese people, Spring Festival lasts for 40 days and has multiple sub-festivals and rituals. The New Year itself is a seven-day-long state holiday, and on the eve of the new year, Chinese families traditionally celebrate with a massive reunion dinner. Considered the year’s most important meal, it is traditionally held in the house of the most senior family member.
(Learn about Lunar New Year with your kids.)
The holiday may be getting more modern, but millennia-old traditions are still held dear in China and other countries. In China, people customarily light firecrackers, which are thought to chase away the fearful monster Nian. (However, the tradition has been on the decline in recent years due to air pollution restrictions that have hit the fireworks industry hard.) The color red is used in clothing and decorations to ensure prosperity, and people exchange hongbao, red envelopes filled with lucky cash.
Meanwhile in Korea, people make rice cake soup and honor their ancestors during Seollal. And during Tet, the Vietnamese Lunar New Year, flowers play an important role in the celebrations.
Left: Each year of the lunisolar calendar is represented by one of 12 animals, called the Chinese Zodiac, which are thought to determine the personalities of people born that year. They are typically incorporated into festivities—like these tiger-themed decorations in Singapore.
Photograph by Then Chih, Xinhua/Redux
Learn about the origins, traditions and significance of Lunar New Year, also known as Chinese New Year or Spring Festival. Find out how it is observed in different countries and regions, and why it prompts the world's largest annual migration.
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Learn about the origins, traditions and celebrations of Chinese New Year, also known as Lunar New Year or Spring Festival. Find out when it falls in the Gregorian calendar and what animal represents each year in the 12-year cycle.
Lunar New Year falls on different dates each year, but always falls between February 10 and February 24 of the international standard calendar. Its traditional Chinese celebrations last for 16 days, from Lunar New Year's Eve to the Lantern Festival. In 2025, Lunar New Year will fall on Wednesday, January 29th and start a year of the Dragon.
Sep 13, 2024 · Learn about the origins, customs, and significance of the Chinese New Year, also known as the Lunar New Year, in this article from Britannica. Find out how people celebrate, what foods they eat, and what animals represent each year in the Chinese zodiac.
