What Is Lunar New Year? And When Is It in 2023?
Everything you need to know about the holiday.
You may have thought that New Year’s was only celebrated on January 1, but you couldn’t be more wrong. In other cultures, New Year’s actually doesn’t take place until much later. It’s referred to as Lunar New Year and is one of the most important Asian holidays of each year.
What is Lunar New Year?
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Did you know that more than 1.5 billion people celebrate the Lunar New Year every year? It’s true! The holiday marks the first new moon of the lunisolar calendar, which is a calendar used in countries like Singapore, China, South Korea, Vietnam and other Asian countries.
Each Lunar New Year is extra special because it corresponds with an animal from the Chinese zodiac, which consists of 12 different animals and cycles through over 12 years. This upcoming year, 2023, is the Year of the Rabbit.
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When is Lunar New Year?
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Unlike the Jan. 1 celebration most of us are used to, the date of the Lunar New Year changes every year.
Americans and many other cultures around the world use the Gregorian calendar to keep track of the days of the year. However, this calendar doesn’t keep track of the moon and sun’s different phases, like the lunisolar calendar does. This lunisolar calendar is used by many ancient cultures and religions and it's the calendar used to determine the Lunar New Year—that's why the holiday falls on different dates each year.
Typically, it is celebrated between January 20 and February 21 of the Gregorian calendar. In 2021, it was on February 23. In 2022, Lunar New Year was Tuesday, February 1, 2022.
This year, Lunar New Year is on Sunday, January 22, 2023.
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What does the Lunar New Year symbolize?
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When it comes to the Lunar New Year, it’s about embracing the popular saying, “Out with the old, in with the new!”
The Lunar New Year symbolizes the beginning of a new year and represents the desire for a new life, while ushering in luck and prosperity with family. It is a time to reflect and celebrate a year of hard work as well as wish for a prosperous and luck-filled future in the year ahead.
Related: 6 Easy Chinese New Year Traditions
How do people celebrate the Lunar New Year?
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While most holidays are only typically celebrated for one day, not this one! The Lunar New Year can be celebrated for multiple days. In fact, depending on what culture is celebrating it, the holiday can be celebrated for up to 15 days. During that time, extravagant events like firework displays, parades and lion and dragon dances can occur.
And while celebratory customs vary between Asian cultures, one of the most popular traditions of the Lunar New Year is to give children money. This tradition is called "lì xì" in Vietnamese or "hóng bāo" in Mandarin and involves parents, grandparents, aunt, uncles and sometimes family friends giving small, red envelopes with cash inside to children. The amount of money inside can range from $1 to hundreds or dollars and reflect numbers of good fortune.
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Besides giving the tradition of money, the Lunar New Year can be celebrated in other ways too. One of those ways is by decorating with the color red because it is associated with happiness and good fortune and has a history of warding off evil spirits.
People also celebrate the holiday by having a family dinner that includes traditional dishes, like fish, longevity noodles, tangyuan, spring rolls and dumplings. Foods like oranges and tangerines are also traditionally gifted during this holiday because they represent luck and wealth and people also do things like sweeping their homes to drive out any bad luck that’s there.
The end of the holiday is usually marked by a beautiful lantern festival, which symbolizes love and hope.