How to Tell Someone's Age From Their Chinese Zodiac Sign
Directly asking an adult's age can feel rude; asking "what's your sign?" (nǐ shǔ shénme?) does the same job politely, because each animal repeats every 12 years.
The method
Once you know the person's animal, there are only a handful of possible birth years — 12 apart. Compare with their rough appearance and you can usually place them within one cycle. For example, someone who is a Dragon and looks to be in their thirties was almost certainly born in 1988, not 1976 or 2000.
The catch
Traditional Chinese age counting (xūsuì) treats a baby as one year old at birth and adds a year at each New Year, so a person's "Chinese age" can be one or two years higher than their Western age. When someone tells you their animal, they mean the calendar animal — the Western-age math still applies.
Use the calculator to confirm any sign, or the full year chart.