Today's Chinese almanac: favorable, avoid, clashes and lucky hours
A single day in the Chinese almanac packs in a lot: favorable and avoid lists, a clash, the fetus god, Pengzu's taboos, lucky directions, good and bad hours… The tool below opens on today and explains each entry in plain English; you can also look up any other date. Everything is explained further down the page.
Look up the almanac for any day
It opens on today (Taiwan time). Change the date to see any day's favorable and avoid lists, each with a plain-English note, plus the day's clash, fetus god, Pengzu taboos, lucky directions and the good and bad hours. Everything is calculated in your browser.
What each almanac entry means
| Entry | What it is | More |
|---|---|---|
| Favorable (yi 宜) and avoid (ji 忌) | Activities the day suits and doesn't suit, from weddings to haircuts | Date selection |
| Clash and sha (chong sha 沖煞) | The zodiac sign the day's branch clashes, and the direction of its sha | Clash and sha |
| Day spirit and day officer | Yellow or Black Path day, and the Twelve Day Officers | Day officers |
| Fetus god (tai shen 胎神) | Where the spirit guarding an unborn child sits today | The fetus god |
| Pengzu's taboos | Two rhyming taboos, one for the day stem and one for the branch | Pengzu's taboos |
| Gods of Joy, Wealth and Fortune | Lucky directions worked out from the day stem | Lucky directions |
| Good and bad hours | Yellow and Black Path spirits for the twelve double-hours | Good and bad hours |
| Lunar mansion | Which of the 28 lunar mansions is "on duty," in a fixed daily rotation | — |
The spirit and the day officer, in brief
Every almanac day carries a spirit (one of twelve; six make it a Yellow Path day, six a Black Path day) and a day officer (one of the Twelve Day Officers, counted from the month branch). Neither decides a day on its own; the favorable and avoid lists have already weighed them.
| Day officer | Traditional use |
|---|---|
| Establish 建 | the day matching the month branch; good for starting and planning, poor for groundbreaking |
| Remove 除 | good for clearing out, cleansing and getting rid of the old |
| Full 滿 | good for gathering and receiving, traditionally poor for burials |
| Balance 平 | an ordinary, level day; fine for routine work |
| Stable 定 | good for settling things: contracts, engagements, fixed plans |
| Hold 執 | good for holding on and building; poor for moving and travel |
| Destruction 破 | the day clashing with the month branch; avoided for most important events |
| Danger 危 | counted as usable by tradition, but not for risky undertakings |
| Success 成 | good for completing things, weddings and openings |
| Receive 收 | good for collecting and harvesting, poor for starting |
| Open 開 | good for beginnings: openings, moving in, starting school |
| Close 閉 | good for closing and sealing up, poor for new starts |
Glossary: the almanac's favorable and avoid entries
These are all 110 entries that appear in the calendars on this site (October 2026 to December 2027), most common first. The same wording appears in printed almanacs across Taiwan, Hong Kong and Chinese communities abroad. A few entries (burials, exhumation, encoffining) belong to funeral customs; a few mention doctors or acupuncture, and those are traditional almanac wording, not health advice.
| Entry | Chinese | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Marriage | 嫁娶 | holding a wedding, including fetching the bride |
| Burials | 安葬 | burying the dead |
| Ancestral offerings | 祭祀 | making offerings to ancestors and deities at home or at a temple |
| Moving in | 入宅 | moving into a new home for the first time |
| Groundbreaking | 動土 | the first digging for building or renovating a house |
| Business opening | 開市 | opening a new business or reopening after a holiday |
| Breaking ground for graves | 破土 | digging for a burial; in the almanac this is about graves, while groundbreaking for houses is a separate entry |
| Travel | 出行 | setting out on a journey |
| Moving house | 移徙 | moving to a new residence |
| Praying for blessings | 祈福 | asking the gods for protection and good fortune |
| Setting up the bed | 安床 | placing a new bed, especially the marriage bed |
| Consecrating statues | 開光 | "opening the eyes" of a new deity statue or charm so it is considered active |
| Construction and repairs | 修造 | building or renovating a house |
| Betrothal gifts | 納采 | the groom's family sending gifts to propose the match, one of the six traditional wedding rites |
| Moving the altar out | 出火 | temporarily moving the family altar before renovating or moving house |
| Building a stove | 作灶 | building or moving the kitchen stove |
| Raising the ridgepole | 上梁 | putting the main roof beam in place, traditionally a key ceremony |
| Planting | 栽種 | sowing and planting |
| Cleansing rites | 解除 | purifying a house and removing bad influences |
| Engagement | 訂盟 | the two families formally agreeing to the match |
| Encoffining | 入殮 | placing the deceased in the coffin |
| Trading | 交易 | buying, selling and doing business deals |
| Signing contracts | 立券 | signing agreements and deeds |
| Nothing else | 餘事勿取 | "do not pick this day for anything else": only the activities listed are favorable |
| Installing doors | 安門 | fitting the main door of a house |
| Visiting family and friends | 會親友 | social visits and gatherings with relatives and friends |
| Praying for children | 求嗣 | rites asking the gods for a child |
| Acquiring livestock | 納畜 | buying or bringing in animals |
| Digging a well | 掘井 | digging a well |
| Felling trees | 伐木 | cutting down trees |
| Demolition | 拆卸 | taking down a building or part of one |
| Taoist rites | 齋醮 | fasting and Taoist offering ceremonies held by priests |
| Roofing | 蓋屋 | putting a roof on a building |
| Laying foundations | 起基 | starting the foundations of a building |
| Exhumation | 啟攢 | opening a grave to collect the bones for reburial, a traditional second burial |
| Putting on mourning | 成服 | relatives changing into mourning clothes |
| Receiving money | 納財 | collecting payments and debts, taking in income |
| Ending mourning | 除服 | taking off mourning clothes when the mourning period ends |
| Bathing | 沐浴 | ritual bathing and cleansing |
| Moving a coffin | 移柩 | moving the coffin, for example to the funeral site |
| Taking in family or staff | 進人口 | adopting, or bringing new household members or employees into the home |
| Coming-of-age rites | 冠笄 | the traditional capping (for men) and hairpin (for women) ceremonies |
| Haircuts | 理髮 | cutting hair |
| Raising animals | 牧養 | raising livestock |
| Funeral processions | 行喪 | holding a funeral procession |
| Thanking the earth god | 謝土 | a rite after building work to thank and settle the spirits of the land |
| Medical treatment | 治病 | a traditional almanac entry about starting treatment |
| Building animal pens | 造畜稠 | building pens and stables for livestock |
| Erecting pillars | 豎柱 | setting up the main pillars of a building |
| Repairing graves | 修墳 | repairing or tidying a family grave |
| Setting up an altar | 安香 | installing the incense altar for deities or ancestors in a home |
| Pest control | 捕捉 | catching pests and vermin |
| Buying property | 置產 | buying land or real estate |
| Making beams | 作梁 | making the beams of a building |
| House cleaning | 掃舍 | a thorough cleaning of the house |
| Digging a pond | 開池 | digging a pond |
| Installing machinery | 安機械 | installing machines or equipment |
| Erecting a gravestone | 立碑 | setting up a headstone |
| Hunting | 畋獵 | hunting |
| Sealing holes | 塞穴 | blocking up burrows and gaps against pests |
| Making nets | 結網 | making fishing or hunting nets |
| Hanging signboards | 掛匾 | putting up a shop sign or plaque |
| Tailoring | 裁衣 | cutting cloth for new clothes, traditionally wedding clothes |
| Taking down walls | 壞垣 | demolishing walls |
| Demolishing a house | 破屋 | pulling down a house |
| Road repair | 平治道塗 | leveling and repairing roads and paths |
| Building a temple | 造廟 | starting work on a temple or shrine |
| Building a bridge | 造橋 | building a bridge |
| Opening a storehouse | 開倉 | releasing stored goods or lending out grain |
| Boatbuilding | 造船 | building a boat |
| Seeing a doctor | 求醫 | a traditional almanac entry about consulting a doctor |
| Making carts | 造車器 | building vehicles or carts |
| Setting pillar bases | 定磉 | placing the stone bases under pillars |
| Shipping goods | 出貨財 | sending out goods or paying out money |
| Starting school | 入學 | starting school or beginning a course of study |
| Visiting the sick | 探病 | visiting someone who is ill |
| Patching walls | 補垣 | repairing holes in walls |
| Repairing walls | 修飾垣牆 | repairing and decorating walls |
| Sculpting and painting | 塑繪 | making deity statues or religious paintings |
| Spinning and weaving | 經絡 | setting up a loom and starting to weave |
| Preparing a grave in advance | 開生墳 | building one's own tomb while still alive, traditionally a sign of longevity |
| Making a coffin | 合壽木 | making a coffin in advance, traditionally meant to bring long life |
| Digging channels | 開渠 | digging ditches and irrigation channels |
| Training livestock | 教牛馬 | training oxen and horses to work |
| Releasing water | 放水 | draining ponds or letting water into or out of fields |
| Lawsuits | 詞訟 | going to court or filing a complaint |
| Putting up scaffolding | 架馬 | setting up the carpenter's trestles to start woodwork |
| Building a toilet | 開廁 | digging or building a toilet |
| Nothing favorable | 諸事不宜 | a day not to schedule anything important; everyday life goes on as usual |
| Trimming nails | 整手足甲 | cutting fingernails and toenails |
| Making curtains | 合帳 | making and hanging bed curtains, traditionally for the bridal bed |
| Acupuncture | 針灸 | a traditional almanac entry about acupuncture and moxibustion |
| Closing the roof ridge | 合脊 | finishing the ridge of the roof |
| Installing mills | 安碓磑 | setting up a grain mortar or millstone |
| Building a storehouse | 造倉 | building a granary or storehouse |
| Drilling pillar holes | 開柱眼 | cutting the joints and holes in pillars |
| Carving | 雕刻 | carving wood or stone, including deity figures |
| Fishing | 取漁 | fishing |
| Ghost Festival offerings | 普渡 | Universal Salvation rites for wandering spirits, mostly in the seventh lunar month |
| Taking up a post | 赴任 | starting a new job or official post |
| Termite control | 斷蟻 | getting rid of termites and ants |
| Betrothal inquiry | 問名 | exchanging the couple's names and birth details, a traditional step before a match |
| Building dikes | 築堤 | building embankments against water |
| Harvesting honey | 割蜜 | taking honey from the hives |
| Learning a craft | 習藝 | starting an apprenticeship or learning a skill |
| Returning home | 歸岫 | coming back home after being away |
| Dividing a household | 分居 | family members splitting into separate households |
| A bride visiting her parents | 歸寧 | the new bride's first return to her family home after the wedding |
| Taking in a son-in-law | 納婿 | a groom marrying into and living with the bride's family |
| Repairing doors | 修門 | repairing doors |
Monthly almanac calendars
Three common misconceptions
Every almanac has the same favorable and avoid lists.
The lists come from the calculation rules of traditional almanac books, and publishers sometimes differ. Ours are computed with lunar.js, the same as our date-selection finder.
"Nothing favorable" (諸事不宜) means you can't do anything that day.
It means the day is not one to schedule big events such as weddings or openings. Everyday life goes on as normal.
The lunar mansion is the constellation you can see that night.
The almanac's mansion of the day is a fixed rotation through the 28 lunar mansions and has nothing to do with the stars actually overhead.
Each entry explained
A straight word: the almanac is a traditional calculation
The favorable and avoid lists, the spirits and the good hours in a Chinese almanac come from the calculation rules of traditional almanac books, and different publishers sometimes disagree. We compute them with the open-source calendar library lunar.js, using exactly the same rules as our date selection finder. It is a piece of cultural heritage, not a scientific forecast: for anything that matters, go by the real circumstances and your own judgment. Everything on this site is for reference and entertainment.
Beyond the almanac: your own BaZi chart
Enter your birth date for a free Four Pillars chart: your Day Master, Five Elements and Ten Gods.
The Chinese almanac: common questions
What is today favorable for in the Chinese almanac?
The tool on this page opens on today and shows the favorable and avoid lists, each with a short explanation, plus the clash, fetus god and lucky hours. You can switch to any other date.
Are the farmers' almanac, huang li and tung shing the same thing?
Yes. Nong min li (farmers' almanac), huang li (yellow calendar) and tong shu or tung shing are names for the same kind of book: the Western and lunar calendars, the solar terms and traditional date-selection information in one volume.
Why do different almanacs give different favorable and avoid lists?
The lists come from traditional calculation rules, and different editions follow slightly different versions of them.