Water · Yin
Pig
Brings. Genuinely kind and hard to provoke. Gives without keeping a ledger.
Struggles with. Trusts too readily and indulges too easily.
Square — friction
Pig and Monkey
Square — friction
60%
Three apart, in the tense square relation. Productive but rarely restful.
Metal · Yang
Monkey
Brings. Solves things sideways. Finds the route nobody else considered.
Struggles with. Bores easily and occasionally treats other people as puzzles rather than persons.
Distance on the wheel3 of 12
RelationSquare — friction
Same fixed elementNo
How Chinese compatibility works
The rule is positional. Animals four apart form an affinity triangle and are read as natural allies — they share instincts and pace. Animals six apart sit directly opposite and are the traditional clash: each values what the other neglects.
This differs from Western astrology, which uses angles on a 360-degree circle. Here the wheel has twelve positions and the relationships are counted in steps, not degrees.
Traditional pairings sometimes override the geometry — a few combinations are named explicitly as friends or enemies in the old texts, and those take precedence.
Computed from 110 years of real lunar new year dates
The arithmetic behind this pairing
Chinese years run 354 or 384 days, so each animal collects a different number of days across the century — the shares below are not 8.33% each.
Positions apart on the cycle
3
Pairings at this distance
12 of 78
Days assigned to Pig
3,306 · 8.3%
Days assigned to Monkey
3,310 · 8.31%
Share of all pairings
1.379%
3 positions apart · 12 of 78 pairings share that distance · 1.379% of all pairings. Neither trine nor clash, where most pairings sit.
Possible age gaps — fixed by the cycle
Because the animals sit at fixed positions, two people with these signs can only differ in age by certain numbers of years. Not approximately — exactly these:
3
years apart
9
years apart
15
years apart
21
years apart
27
years apart
33
years apart
39
years apart
45
years apart
Recent birth-year combinations
Metal Pig 2031 & Earth Monkey 2028
3 years apart
Earth Pig 2019 & Fire Monkey 2016
3 years apart
Earth Pig 2019 & Earth Monkey 2028
9 years apart
Fire Pig 2007 & Wood Monkey 2004
3 years apart
Fire Pig 2007 & Fire Monkey 2016
9 years apart
Wood Pig 1995 & Water Monkey 1992
3 years apart
Wood Pig 1995 & Wood Monkey 2004
9 years apart
Water Pig 1983 & Metal Monkey 1980
3 years apart
The five versions of each animal
The animal repeats every 12 years but the element every 60, so each partner comes in five variants — and the combination you actually have is one of 25.
Wood Pig
1995
Fire Pig
2007
Earth Pig
2019
Metal Pig
2031
Water Pig
1983
Water Monkey
1992
Wood Monkey
2004
Fire Monkey
2016
Earth Monkey
2028
Metal Monkey
1980
Birth years for this pairing
⚠️ Each year starts at the lunar new year, not 1 January — if either of you was born in January or early February, check the exact date before trusting the animal.
Pig
1971 · 1983 · 1995 · 2007 · 2019 · 2031Monkey
1968 · 1980 · 1992 · 2004 · 2016 · 2028