Cusp dates
The Cancer and Leo cusp
The Cancer and Leo cusp falls on July 22 and July 23. Most tables give July 22 to Cancer and July 23 to Leo, but the Sun moves from one sign to the other at a single moment, and that moment changes from year to year.
The dates
Cancer runs June 21–July 22 and Leo runs July 23–August 22 in the standard tropical table this site uses for every tool and page. The cusp days are the last standard day of Cancer and the first standard day of Leo. If your birthday is on any other day you do not need this page. Your sign is in the Cancer guide or the Leo guide.
When the Sun enters Leo, 2026 to 2028
Exact times from the ingress data on this site, shown in UTC and in four local time zones.
Swipe the table sideways →
| Year | UTC | Vancouver | Toronto | London | Sydney |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2026 | Jul 22, 19:13 UTC | Jul 22, 12:13 pm | Jul 22, 3:13 pm | Jul 22, 8:13 pm | Jul 23, 5:13 am |
| 2027 | Jul 23, 01:05 UTC | Jul 22, 6:05 pm | Jul 22, 9:05 pm | Jul 23, 2:05 am | Jul 23, 11:05 am |
| 2028 | Jul 22, 06:54 UTC | Jul 21, 11:54 pm | Jul 22, 2:54 am | Jul 22, 7:54 am | Jul 22, 4:54 pm |
Why the year matters
The Sun takes about 365 days, 5 hours and 49 minutes to come back to the same point on the ecliptic, but a calendar year has 365 days, or 366 in a leap year. So the moment the Sun enters Leo drifts against the clock. In the data on this site it arrives 5 hours 52 minutes later on the clock in 2027 than in 2026, and 18 hours 11 minutes earlier on the clock in 2028 than in 2027, because February 29 falls between the two dates. Leap days pull it back every four years, which is why the change keeps landing on July 22 or July 23 instead of wandering off. The Moon and the other planets tug the Earth slightly, so the figures are never quite regular.
Why birth time and time zone matter
Take 2026. The Sun entered Leo at 19:13 UTC on July 22. In Vancouver the clocks read 12:13 pm on July 22, so someone born in Vancouver later that day was born a Leo even though the date on their birth certificate is the last standard day of Cancer.
It works the other way too. In 2026 the change reached Sydney at 5:13 am local time on July 23, so a baby born in Sydney on July 23 before 5:13 am is still a Cancer, even though most tables would call July 23 a Leo birthday.
This is why the table above gives four cities. The same instant falls at different local times, and near midnight it falls on different dates. Daylight saving time moves the local clock as well, and the times above already allow for it.
How to check your sign
- Find your birth date, the time on your birth record and the place you were born.
- Convert that local time to UTC. Remember daylight saving time if it was in force that day.
- Compare it with the time the Sun entered Leo that year. Before that moment you are a Cancer, and from it onward you are a Leo.
For 2026, 2027 and 2028 the birthday sign lookup and the year calendars (2026, 2027, 2028) list the exact times. The data on this site covers those three years only. For any other birth year you need an ephemeris or a chart calculator that takes your birth time and place.
Where this cusp sits in the year
Around July 22 or 23 the Sun leaves Cancer for Leo, in the heat of northern midsummer. This boundary is unusual in traditional astrology because it joins the two signs ruled by the luminaries. Cancer belongs to the Moon and Leo belongs to the Sun. Cancer is cardinal water and Leo is fixed fire. The old rulership scheme starts from exactly this pair and hands the other planets their signs outward from here.
How popular astrology reads this cusp
Popular astrology reads people born near this cusp as caring and proud at once: Cancer's loyalty to family with Leo's need to be seen. Gary Goldschneider's book The Secret Language of Birthdays calls the week around this change the Cusp of Oscillation, because the moods can swing from private to dramatic. If you were born on one of these days, it is worth checking the year, because the change can fall on either date depending on where and when you were born.
Read more
Read the Cancer guide and the Leo guide, see the July zodiac calendar, or go back to all 12 cusps.