Cusp dates

The Libra and Scorpio cusp

The Libra and Scorpio cusp falls on October 22 and October 23. Most tables give October 22 to Libra and October 23 to Scorpio, but the Sun moves from one sign to the other at a single moment, and that moment changes from year to year.

The dates

Libra runs September 23–October 22 and Scorpio runs October 23–November 21 in the standard tropical table this site uses for every tool and page. The cusp days are the last standard day of Libra and the first standard day of Scorpio. If your birthday is on any other day you do not need this page. Your sign is in the Libra guide or the Scorpio guide.

When the Sun enters Scorpio, 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 →

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 Scorpio drifts against the clock. In the data on this site it arrives 5 hours 55 minutes later on the clock in 2027 than in 2026, and 18 hours 20 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 October 22 or October 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 2028. The Sun entered Scorpio at 21:13 UTC on October 22. In Vancouver the clocks read 2:13 pm on October 22, so someone born in Vancouver later that day was born a Scorpio even though the date on their birth certificate is the last standard day of Libra.

It works the other way too. In 2026 the change reached Vancouver at 2:38 am local time on October 23, so a baby born in Vancouver on October 23 before 2:38 am is still a Libra, even though most tables would call October 23 a Scorpio 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

1. Find your birth date, the time on your birth record and the place you were born.
2. Convert that local time to UTC. Remember daylight saving time if it was in force that day.
3. Compare it with the time the Sun entered Scorpio that year. Before that moment you are a Libra, and from it onward you are a Scorpio.

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 October 22 or 23 the Sun moves from Libra into Scorpio, in the middle of northern autumn. Libra is cardinal air ruled by Venus. Scorpio is fixed water ruled by Mars in traditional astrology and by Pluto in modern astrology. In the traditional scheme this boundary hands the year from Venus to Mars, the two planets that sit opposite each other in the rulership pattern, which is part of why astrologers give it so much attention.

How popular astrology reads this cusp

Popular astrology reads someone born near this cusp as diplomatic on the surface and intense underneath: Libra's grace and Scorpio's depth. Gary Goldschneider's book The Secret Language of Birthdays calls the week around this change the Cusp of Drama and Criticism. If you were born on October 22 or 23, both descriptions may ring true in places. Your Sun sign is still one or the other, and the exact time for your birth year decides it.

Read more

Read the Libra guide and the Scorpio guide, see the October zodiac calendar, or go back to all 12 cusps.