Birthstone and Birth Flower Finder

Pick a birth month (or a full date) to see the modern and traditional birthstones, how hard each one is, and the two flowers tied to that month.

For entertainment and self-reflection: Birthstones and flower meanings are traditions and trade conventions, not properties of the stones or plants. Nothing on this page is a prediction, and it is not financial, medical, psychological or legal advice. Use it as a prompt for thought, not as a basis for decisions.

How this finder works

There is no calculation in the mathematical sense here: a birthstone and a birth flower are assigned by month. What the tool adds is a careful reading of the lists, because there is more than one. It shows the modern birthstone list used by jewellers in the United States, which traces back to a list adopted in 1912 by the National Association of Jewelers (now Jewelers of America) and has been amended a few times since: alexandrite, citrine, pink tourmaline and zircon were added in 1952, tanzanite was added for December in 2002, and spinel joined peridot and sardonyx for August in 2016. Alongside it you get the traditional stone, which in a few months differs, such as bloodstone for March. The hardness figure uses the Mohs scale, which ranks minerals from 1 (talc) to 10 (diamond) by which one can scratch which.

Birth flowers come from a looser tradition with no governing body. The pairs shown here are the ones most commonly listed by British and American gardening and florist sources. Where a month has two flowers, the first is the more widely used.

The full list

Worked example

Enter a birthday of August 15. The finder shows peridot and spinel as the modern August stones, with sardonyx as the older traditional choice. Peridot rates about 6.5 to 7 on the Mohs scale, which is fine for earrings and pendants but can scuff in a ring worn every day; spinel, at about 8, is tougher. The birth flowers are the gladiolus and the poppy. Put together, a thoughtful gift for someone born in August might be a spinel pendant with a small bunch of gladioli, or, on a budget, a pressed-poppy card.

Now try June. June is unusual in having three modern stones: pearl, moonstone and alexandrite. Pearl is the softest gem on the whole list at 2.5 to 4.5, so the finder adds a care tip: keep pearls away from perfume and hairspray and store them apart from harder jewellery.

Where birthstones came from

The idea of a set of twelve stones is very old. The Book of Exodus (chapter 28) describes the breastplate of the high priest Aaron, set with twelve gems in four rows, one for each tribe of Israel. In the first century AD the historian Flavius Josephus connected those twelve stones with the twelve months and the signs of the zodiac, and around the year 400 St Jerome wrote about them too. For centuries, though, people tended to own all twelve and wear the stone of the current month, rather than keep one stone for life.

The custom of a single stone linked to your birth month seems to have spread in the eighteenth century, often credited to gem dealers in Poland or Germany, and it was popularised in Britain and America in the nineteenth. The 1912 American list standardised what had become a confusing mix of regional variants, and the jewellery trade has updated it since, which is worth knowing: the modern list is partly a marketing document. That does not make it less fun, but it does mean there is no single "correct" stone. Many people simply wear the one they like best among their month's options.

Ancient identifications are also slippery. Many old texts used names by colour rather than mineral, so the "sapphire" of antiquity was very likely lapis lazuli, and several red stones were all called carbuncle. Modern gemmology, which identifies stones by chemistry and crystal structure, only took shape in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.

Birth flowers and the language of flowers

Birth flowers draw on the Victorian fashion for floriography, the "language of flowers", in which bouquets carried coded messages. Dozens of little dictionaries were published in Britain, France and America in the nineteenth century, and they did not always agree, so a flower can carry different meanings in different books. The month assignments also reflect a northern European growing season: the snowdrop for January, the daffodil for March, the rose for June and the chrysanthemum for November. If you live somewhere with a different climate, as we do in the Nevada desert, feel free to pick a flower that actually blooms near your birthday.

Using it for gifts and planning

The most practical use of this finder is gift planning. Three tips come up again and again:

• Match the stone to the wear. For an everyday ring, stones of 8 or above on the Mohs scale (diamond, ruby, sapphire, spinel, topaz, alexandrite) hold up best. Softer stones such as opal, pearl and turquoise suit earrings and pendants.
• Use the alternatives. If the classic stone is outside your budget, look at the other choices for the month: red spinel instead of ruby, citrine instead of topaz, or a lab-grown version of the classic, which is chemically the same stone.
• Pair stone and flower. A small birthstone gift with the month's flowers is a simple, personal combination that does not depend on knowing someone's star sign or birth time.

For self-reflection, some people choose to treat their stone as a small reminder of a quality they want to grow: the steadiness of a hard stone, or the patience it takes to grow a pearl. That meaning comes from you, not the mineral, which is exactly what makes it personal.

Frequently asked questions

Sources and further reading

• Jewelers of America, "Birthstones" (modern US list and history).
• Gemological Institute of America (GIA), Gem Encyclopedia: entries for each birthstone and hardness values.
• Kunz, G. F. The Curious Lore of Precious Stones, 1913, chapter on birthstones (public domain).
• Exodus 28:15–21; Josephus, Antiquities of the Jews 3.7; Wikipedia: "Birthstone", "Mohs scale".
• Wikipedia: "Language of flowers"; Royal Horticultural Society plant profiles.

By Stanley King · About 8calc · Last reviewed October 2026

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