Eclipses in 2027: Dates, Signs, and the August 2 Total Solar Eclipse

There are five eclipses in 2027: two of the Sun and three of the Moon. The one everyone is waiting for is the total solar eclipse of August 2, 2027, at 9°55′ Leo, with up to 6 minutes 23 seconds of totality, the second-longest total eclipse of the 21st century; the other solar eclipse is an annular “ring of fire” on February 6 at 17°39′ Aquarius.

In this guide

1. All five eclipses of 2027
2. The total solar eclipse of August 2, 2027
3. The annular solar eclipse of February 6
4. The three lunar eclipses
5. What the signs are, and why these three axes
6. Who is touched: birthdays and houses
7. Which house each eclipse falls in
8. How Ptolemy timed an eclipse’s effects
9. Frequently asked questions

All five eclipses of 2027

Times are Universal Time (UT) at the moment of greatest eclipse, calculated with the Swiss Ephemeris, the reference behind professional astrology software. The degree is the position of the Moon then, in the tropical zodiac. For a solar eclipse that is also the position of the Sun; for a lunar eclipse the Sun sits at the opposite degree. Our degrees agree to within a few arcminutes with the ones published by Bonnie Sorsby and Cafe Astrology.

The total solar eclipse of August 2, 2027

NASA lists it as a total eclipse of Saros series 136 with a magnitude of 1.079 and a greatest duration of 6 minutes 23.2 seconds, the second-longest total eclipse of the 21st century after July 22, 2009, with none longer until June 3, 2114 (Wikipedia). Totality runs through southern Spain and Gibraltar, northern Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia and Libya, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Somalia. In astrology, an eclipse of the Sun is a New Moon at its most extreme: the Moon covers the Sun, so it is read as a reset, an ending or a beginning in the area of life that sign and house govern.

How long totality lasts depends on where you stand. We calculated it for the centre of eight cities on the path:

The pattern is simple: the closer to the centre line, the longer the totality. Luxor, near the point of greatest duration, gets 6 minutes 21 seconds; Cádiz gets 2 minutes 51 seconds; Málaga, near the northern edge of the path, 1 minute 48 seconds. Our figures are for the city centre and ignore the Moon’s mountains and valleys, so published local times can differ by several seconds.

If you live in the United States, there is no totality, and the next total solar eclipse in the contiguous United States is not until August 23, 2044, over Montana, North Dakota and a corner of South Dakota. Our calculation gives the northeastern US only a small partial eclipse on the morning of August 2: from New York the Moon covers about 9% of the Sun’s width (magnitude 0.09) around 11 a.m. EDT.

The annular solar eclipse of February 6

On February 6 the Moon is too far from Earth to cover the Sun completely, so a thin ring of sunlight remains. NASA lists it as annular, Saros 131, with a greatest duration of 7 minutes 53.5 seconds, longer than the total eclipse that follows. It falls at 17°39′ Aquarius and is the first of the year’s two solar eclipses. Astrologers read it as a new beginning in the themes of Aquarius: friends, groups, technology and shared ideals, along with the house it lands in for each person (see below). The path crosses the far south of Chile and Argentina and the Atlantic, so few people will see the ring; most of South America and parts of Africa and Antarctica see a partial eclipse.

The three lunar eclipses

All three lunar eclipses of 2027 are penumbral: the Moon passes only through the faint outer part of Earth’s shadow and never enters the dark inner part. A penumbral eclipse is easy to miss, because the Moon just looks a little dimmer, and many astrologers give it less weight than a total or partial lunar eclipse. Three very different sizes:

• February 20 (1°58′ Virgo) is the biggest, with a penumbral magnitude of 0.93 over about 4 hours, visible from the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia. The Sun is at the opposite degree, 1°58′ Pisces.
• July 18 (25°57′ Capricorn) is almost no eclipse at all: a penumbral magnitude of 0.001 lasting roughly 11 minutes. It will be essentially invisible, though it still counts as an eclipse in the tables.
• August 17 (24°04′ Aquarius) follows the total solar eclipse by two weeks, with a penumbral magnitude of 0.55 over about 3.6 hours, visible from the Pacific and the Americas.

Our guide to Moon phases explains how astrology reads the Full Moon in general; an eclipse is the version where the alignment is exact enough for a shadow. Every full and new Moon of the year, with signs and US times, is in our 2027 Moon calendar.

What the signs are, and why these three axes

Eclipses happen only when a New or Full Moon is close to the Moon’s nodes, the two points where its orbit crosses the Sun’s path, which is why they come in pairs two weeks apart about twice a year. Our North Node guide explains the nodes. The result for 2027 is that the five eclipses sit on three zodiac axes: Aquarius–Leo (February 6, August 2 and August 17), Pisces–Virgo (February 20) and Cancer–Capricorn (July 18). The first is the one that carries the year’s two main eclipses, and some astrologers describe the Aquarius–Leo axis in terms of the individual against the group, or the creative self against the collective. Whether you find that meaningful or not, you can check the degrees yourself with our Stellium Calculator, which lists every planet in your birth chart to the degree.

Who is touched: birthdays and houses

The usual astrological rule is that an eclipse affects you most when it falls near a planet or angle in your birth chart, typically within a few degrees, on either end of the axis. We tested how many people that is, using the Swiss Ephemeris for 60,000 random people with US birth dates from 1994 to 2014 (weighted by the number of births each day) and counting a hit when a body was within the orb of the eclipse degree or its opposite degree:

The numbers are nearly the same for every eclipse, because any 20° stretch of the zodiac holds roughly the same share of people. That is the first lesson: each eclipse “touches” about one person in four through a personal planet or the Sun, which is why astrologers who say that an eclipse “affects everyone born in a certain sign” are claiming something very broad. A tight orb, a planet right on the degree, narrows it to one in six.

The second lesson is about the Moon: because it moves about 13° a day, whether the Moon is within 5° of an eclipse point on your birth date depends on your birth time. For the birthday windows above, use the Sun, which only moves one degree a day. To see where the Sun, Moon and planets were at your birth, use our Birth Chart calculator, or the Stellium Calculator if you want all ten bodies.

Which house each eclipse falls in

Besides your planets, astrologers read the house the eclipse falls in. Using whole-sign houses, in which your rising sign is the 1st house and each sign after it the next, the table shows the house for every rising sign. For a solar eclipse the house is where the new beginning is said to start; for a lunar eclipse, where something is said to come to a head or be released. Our guide to the twelve houses explains what each house covers, and our rising sign profiles help you find yours.

Two rising signs get both big eclipses in the same house: Leo rising has the Aquarius eclipses in the 7th house of partnerships and the Leo eclipse in the 1st house of the self, and Aquarius rising the reverse. Scorpio rising gets the total eclipse in the 10th house of career, and Cancer rising in the 2nd house of money.

How Ptolemy timed an eclipse’s effects

The most detailed ancient rule for eclipses comes from the 2nd-century astrologer Claudius Ptolemy, who gave a way of timing how long an eclipse’s effects last:

“For when these data are examined, if it is a solar eclipse, we shall understand that the predicted event lasts as many years as the equinoctial hours which we discover, and if a lunar eclipse, as many months.”

Ptolemy, Tetrabiblos, Book II, chapter 6, “Of the Time of the Predicted Events,” trans. F. E. Robbins, Loeb Classical Library (1940), via LacusCurtius

“Equinoctial hours” are ordinary 60-minute hours. In the same chapter he says the hours must be counted at the place concerned, since “the same solar eclipses do not everywhere have the same degree of obscuration or the same time of duration,” and an editorial note in the Loeb text adds that Ptolemy takes no account of eclipses not visible at the place concerned. In other words, an eclipse counts for you only if you could have seen it. Ptolemy gives no worked example, so applying it needs a reading of “the hours of the eclipse.” Taking the whole eclipse from first to last contact, our calculation gives these durations for August 2:

So by Ptolemy’s own rule the same eclipse would last 1.5 years for a New Yorker and nearly 3 for someone in Luxor. That is the kind of detail missing from most modern eclipse forecasts, which describe one outcome for everyone born under a sign. It also shows why the tradition has always been a framework for reflection: no controlled study has found that eclipses predict events in anyone’s life, and this page presents the traditional readings as culture, not as prediction. Our guide to Ptolemy’s Tetrabiblos explains the rest of his system.

Frequently asked questions

How many eclipses are there in 2027?+

Five: two solar and three lunar. The solar eclipses are the annular eclipse of February 6 and the total eclipse of August 2. The lunar eclipses, all penumbral, are on February 20, July 18 and August 17.

When is the total solar eclipse in 2027?+

August 2, 2027, with greatest eclipse at 10:06 UT. Totality lasts up to 6 minutes 23 seconds (NASA), the second longest of the 21st century, and crosses southern Spain, northern Africa, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Yemen and Somalia.

Can I see the August 2, 2027 eclipse from the United States?+

Not totality. Our calculation gives the northeastern United States only a small partial eclipse in the morning (about 9% of the Sun’s width from New York). The next total solar eclipse in the contiguous United States is on August 23, 2044.

What sign is the August 2027 solar eclipse in?+

Leo, at 9°55′. The February 6 annular eclipse is in Aquarius at 17°39′.

Are the 2027 lunar eclipses visible?+

All three are penumbral, the faintest kind: the Moon only dims slightly. February 20 (magnitude 0.93) is the most noticeable, from the Americas, Europe, Africa and Asia. July 18 has a magnitude of 0.001, essentially invisible.

How do I know whether an eclipse affects me astrologically?+

Traditionally, an eclipse is read as strongest when it falls within a few degrees of a planet or angle in your birth chart, or in a house you can identify from your rising sign. About one person in four has the Sun, Moon, Mercury, Venus or Mars within 5° of a given eclipse axis, so it is common rather than special.

How long do eclipse effects last, according to astrology?+

Ptolemy’s rule is as many years as the eclipse lasts in hours for a solar eclipse, and as many months for a lunar one, counted only where the eclipse was visible. Many modern astrologers use looser windows of six months or a year.

Do eclipses really predict events?+

No controlled study has found that they do. Eclipse astrology is a cultural tradition with an ancient history, which people use for reflection; the dates and positions on this page are calculated astronomy, the meanings are interpretation.