2018 Chinese Zodiac: Year of the Earth Dog

沉浸 TeamAugust 26, 20264 min read

The 2018 Chinese zodiac animal is the Dog. More precisely, 2018 was the Year of the Earth Dog (戊戌 wùxū): the zodiac year ran from February 16, 2018 to February 4, 2019. If you were born in that window, your Chinese zodiac sign is the Dog (狗 gǒu).

One catch before anything else: the zodiac year follows the lunar calendar, not January 1. Born in 2018 before February 16? Then you belong to the previous animal, the Fire Rooster. The next section has the exact dates.

2018 Chinese zodiac at a glance

Animal: Dog (狗 gǒu), the eleventh of the 12 zodiac animals
Element: Earth (土 tǔ)
Traditional name: 戊戌 (wùxū) in the 60-year cycle
Dates: February 16, 2018 to February 4, 2019
Lucky numbers: 3, 4, 9
Lucky colors: red, green, purple

Born in January or February 2018?

Chinese New Year fell on February 16 in 2018. So:

Born January 1 to February 15, 2018: you're a Fire Rooster (rooster year 2017), not a Dog.
Born February 16 or later in 2018: you're a Earth Dog.

This is the single most common mistake people make with the Chinese zodiac. When a January or February birthday is involved, always check the new year date before assuming the animal.

The Earth Dog personality

Dogs are the zodiac's loyal hearts: honest, protective, and allergic to injustice. They'd rather be right than rich, and they never abandon their people. They carry the world's worries on their shoulders, sometimes more than their share.

Earth is the element of stability. It adds patience, reliability, and a practical, grounded streak. In the 60-year cycle each animal pairs with one of five elements, so a Earth Dog (born 2018) reads a little different from Dogs of other years: the earth side colors how the dog's core traits show up.

Strengths:

Loyal beyond question
Honest and fair-minded
Protective of the weak
Steady in a crisis

Watch out for:

Anxious and pessimistic
Judgmental when let down
Slow to relax

Dogs do meaningful work in law, medicine, education, activism, and security, in jobs with a moral core.

2018 zodiac compatibility

Traditional Chinese astrology groups the 12 animals into "trines" of three signs that share a temperament, and pairs each sign with a "secret friend" and one clash.

Best matches for the Dog: the Tiger and the Horse (trine partners), plus the Rabbit, the Dog's secret friend.
Trickiest match: the Dragon, the Dog's opposite on the zodiac wheel.

Treat this as folk wisdom rather than fate. Plenty of happy couples "clash" on paper, and Chinese families today read these charts with a wink more often than a frown.

How to say it in Chinese

狗 (gǒu): dog
生肖 (shēngxiào): Chinese zodiac sign
我属狗 (wǒ shǔ gǒu): "I'm a Dog." The verb 属 (shǔ) means "to belong to"
本命年 (běnmìngnián): your own zodiac year, when your animal comes back around

Born in 2018? Your next 本命年 is 2030, the next Dog year after 2026. Tradition says to wear red that year for luck.

Want to go beyond the zodiac? Create a free Chenjin account to hear words like 狗 and 生肖 pronounced by native-quality audio, save them as flashcards, and start reading real Chinese stories at your level.

Other Dog years

1970: Metal Dog (February 6, 1970 to January 26, 1971)
1982: Water Dog (January 25, 1982 to February 12, 1983)
1994: Wood Dog (February 10, 1994 to January 30, 1995)
2006: Fire Dog (January 29, 2006 to February 17, 2007)
2030: Metal Dog (February 3, 2030 to January 22, 2031)

Read the full Year of the Dog guide for the personality in depth, or look up a different birth year on the Chinese zodiac overview.

2018 Chinese zodiac FAQ

What animal is 2018 in the Chinese zodiac?

2018 is the Year of the Dog. Anyone born from February 16, 2018 to February 4, 2019 is a Dog; a birthday earlier in 2018 belongs to the Year of the Rooster.

What element is 2018?

Earth. The full sign for 2018 is the Earth Dog (戊戌 wùxū), a combination that repeats only once every 60 years.

How old is someone born in 2018?

Someone born in 2018 turns 8 in 2026, or is still 7 if their birthday hasn't come around yet this year. In traditional Chinese age counting (虚岁 xūsuì), you'd add one more, since babies are counted as one year old at birth.