Makar Sankranti 2027 falls on Thursday, January 14, the day the Sun enters Capricorn.
What the day marks
This is the start of Uttarayan, as the Sun turns from its southward to its northward course. The same day is celebrated as Lohri in Punjab, Pongal in Tamil Nadu, and Magh Bihu in Assam. Sharing til-gud (sesame and jaggery), flying kites, and a holy dip in the Ganga are the day’s traditions.
When the punyakaal falls
The punyakaal for bathing and charity runs from sunrise through the afternoon, with the entire window from the exact moment of Sankranti to sunset counted as auspicious.
The Maha Punyakaal window
Within the broader punyakaal, panchang makers mark out a narrower Maha Punyakaal, roughly the first five ghatis (about two hours) after the exact moment the Sun crosses into Capricorn. Charity given in this shorter window is held to carry more merit than the same act done later in the day. Families who take this seriously plan the bath and the first round of donations to land inside those two hours rather than stretching it across the whole afternoon.
What actually gets given also follows a pattern. Til (black sesame) and gud (jaggery) come first, usually as laddoos or a simple mixed offering, since the whole festival takes its common name from that pairing. Beyond sweets, the customary donation list includes khichdi (rice and lentils), woollen blankets or shawls, and a small earthen lamp filled with til oil. Many households donate in units tied to the family, one set of items per member, rather than a single lump offering, and give to a temple or to someone who needs the warmth more than a token amount matters in January.
Why the date has drifted from mid-January
Makar Sankranti is unusual among major Hindu festivals because it follows the solar calendar, not the lunar one. Most festival dates (Diwali, Navratri, Holi) shift by weeks year to year since they track the Moon; Sankranti tracks the Sun’s sidereal position and so lands on nearly the same Gregorian date every year, typically January 14 or 15.
“Nearly the same” is doing real work in that sentence. Because of the precession of the equinoxes, the sidereal zodiac slips against the fixed Gregorian calendar by roughly one day every 70 to 80 years. Two centuries ago Sankranti fell around January 12; by the year 2100 it will have moved to around January 15 or 16, and by 2200 closer to January 21. The panchang calculation accounts for this automatically, which is why the date creeps a day later every few generations even though nobody changes the ritual itself.
Kite flying: the part that needs a safety note
In Gujarat especially, where the day is known as Uttarayan, kite flying isn’t a side activity, it’s the main event, with rooftops full of families from sunrise well into the evening. The one thing worth knowing if you’re new to it or bringing kids along: the glass-coated cotton thread traditionally used to cut rival kites, called manjha, has been banned or restricted in several Indian cities and states because of injuries to birds, and to two-wheeler riders whose necks catch a stray line at road level. Plain cotton thread without the glass coating is the safer, and now often the only legal, option in those places. If you’re flying kites with family visiting from abroad who haven’t seen this before, it’s worth mentioning upfront rather than letting them find out the hard way.
Check the timing for your city
Check the muhurat page with your city selected for that day’s sunrise.