How to recover your birth time
Your birth time determines the Rising sign and the twelve houses. Without it, the chart can still be built but loses a whole layer — so ten minutes of digging is worth it.
- Your original birth certificate — many record the hour and minute in the notes or on the back.
- Hospital or maternity records — the hospital where you were born often kept the time on file.
- Ask your family — parents, siblings and neighbours often remember whether it was morning or night.
- The hospital birth record — separate from the certificate, and usually more precisely timestamped.
If you only remember the part of day, choose Approximate birth time when entering — the system lists the possible Rising signs instead of guessing one fixed hour. Remember nothing at all? Still fine: the chart is built from the Sun and Moon, and says plainly which parts are left open.