Birthday Star

364 days a year we can celebrate our non-birthday, but there is only one day a year that your friends and family can worship your presence on this earth. Indeed, the culmination of thousands of years of hardship, love stories and battles has resulted in your arrival on this plane of existence. For the curious among us, fascinated by this seemingly random event, we are always looking and researching ourselves, our birth charts, the zodiac and star signs. Our birthdates and planetary placements can help us to find out more about ourselves, and astrologically it’s fascinating, but if you’re anything of a stargazer like me, you look up at the night sky and the stars and just gaze in wonderment.

What is a birthday star?

Starlight takes a long time to travel through space to reach us. When light from a given star has taken as long as your lifetime to reach our planet, it is called a "birthday star".

So, for example, if you are 25 years old today and you look up your birthday star using the calculator, it will give you a list of stars and their constellations. Those stars are located about 25 light-years away which means that the photons coming from them is as old as you are! 

In addition, your birthday star or stars will change every year due to the fact that you are getting older. So next year, you'll want to find stars that are 26 light-years away from Earth.

Some of the photons coming from the stars are just as old as you are.

How to find out your birthday star?

To look up your birth star is as easy as typing in your birthday information inside this birthday star calculator, and using the information given in the chart. This chart will give you a breakdown of the name, coordinates, readings and even help you to see it better at night by giving you its luminosity, as well as telling you if you need binoculars or a telescope to view it. 

Simply enter your birthday and today's date into the calculator in order to find out your current birthday star.

The calculator will show you a list of stars whose light has been travelling in space for as many years as your lifetime.

How to find your birthday star in the sky?

In order to locate your birthday star in your local night sky, you can use this handy sky map app called Stellarium, which will let you search the coordinates of your star. And after you can use the app to have a little mooch around the sky above from the comfort of your bed, and you can look up at the various star placements through your phone screen. 

It maps out the zodiacs and significant celestial stellar bodies in our glorious night sky and has an informational tab about different cultures’ relation and uses of the sky and stars placement. 

The "observe" tab lets you zoom in on certain mapped planets and see high-resolution images. Researching something like this for yourself or as a surprise for someone else is going to be a lovely experience either way. 

And i cannot recommend it enough if you want to feel magical and in awe of the universe around us. 

Stellarium is a great tool for finding out the location of your birthday star in your local sky.

Can you buy your birthday star?

Technically, no, you cannot buy a birthday star online. The idea of buying a star is a marketing gimmick that some companies use to sell star-naming services, but in reality, stars cannot be owned or sold.

The naming of stars and the creation of star maps and certificates are not recognized by any official astronomical organizations, and do not confer any legal rights or ownership over a star.

The universe and everything in it, including stars, belong to everyone and no one, and it is not possible to claim ownership or control over any celestial bodies. While the idea of buying a birthday star can be a fun and sentimental gift for a loved one, it is important to understand that they do not confer any legitimate astronomical or legal rights or ownership.