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Sun-sign compatibility · water and earth · opposite signs

Cancer and Capricorn compatibility

Cancer and Capricorn are opposite signs on the wheel, an opposition of about 180°: water and earth, both cardinal. Astrology reads the angle between two Sun signs as the first measure of a pair, and the rest of the two charts as the rest of the story.

This year the Sun is in Cancer from 21 June to 22 July and in Capricorn from 21 December to 20 January. 7 famous couples in StarMap's dataset are a Cancer and a Capricorn, where chance would give about 6.1: Marlene Dietrich and Yul Brynner, Ariana Grande and Mac Miller and Pamela Anderson and Adil Rami among them. Among the 537 couples with both Sun signs certain, that makes this the 41st most common pairing of the 78. A Sun sign is one placement of ten, and the two whole charts say far more than the two signs.

Each sign has its own page: Cancer and Capricorn, with its dates to the minute, its traits and the famous people born under it.

7 famous Cancer and Capricorn couples, scored chart against chart.How do your two charts compare?Compare two whole charts, free: every angle between your planets

What astrology reads for Cancer and Capricorn

Opposite signs face each other across the wheel, and astrology reads an opposition between two Suns as attraction with a question in it. The two signs share a modality and belong to elements that feed each other, so the pair wants to act in the same rhythm from complementary strengths, and each tends to carry what the other has left out. The tradition reads this as the angle of the classic couple: the one people notice.

What each sign lacks, the opposite sign has, and the reading is that this is both the pull and the problem. Oppositions tend to swing between fascination and exasperation, each person wanting the quality they admire in the other and resenting it on the same day. Astrologers read the pairing as one that learns balance by living without it first, and look to the Moons and the rising signs for how the swing settles.

Water with earth

Earth with water is read as the gentlest of the mixed pairings: water feels and earth holds, and each tends to make the other feel safe. The tradition reads these two as home-makers in the broad sense, slow, loyal and private, with an ease that other pairs work for. The reading's caution is that comfort can become a habit, and that the pair may let the wider world go quiet around them.

Cardinal with cardinal

Both signs are cardinal, the starting signs of their seasons, and the tradition reads two cardinal people as two leaders in one relationship: both want to set the direction, and the question is who goes first on which day. The reading is of a pair that gets a great deal started and has to decide on purpose who finishes.

These are readings of the Sun signs alone, written for reflection and entertainment. They describe tendencies the tradition assigns to an angle, not two people, and they do not say whether a pair lasts.

Cancer in love, Capricorn in love

Cancer

In love, Cancer commits. It wants a home with someone in it, and it shows love by looking after: the meal, the blanket, the message to check you got back. It is easily hurt and slow to say so. Its lesson is that a partner cannot read the mood it is hiding, however well it reads theirs.

Capricorn

In love, Capricorn is slow, careful and then constant. It shows commitment by showing up, year after year, and it finds romance easier to practise than to declare. Its lesson is that a partner wants to be let in, not only provided for.

483 famous people have the Sun in Cancer for certain and 468 in Capricorn: every Cancer Sun and every Capricorn Sun, each with a birth chart.

Famous Cancer and Capricorn couples

Of the 537 spouse and partner pairs in StarMap’s dataset whose Sun signs are both certain, 7 are Cancer and Capricorn. From the share of each sign among every couple’s members, chance alone would give about 6.1, a ratio of 1.14, which makes this the 41st most common pairing of the 78. Their sky match, from the angles between the two charts, averages 65 out of 100 against 67 for every couple counted. With about seven couples a cell, a ratio between a half and double is what chance produces; the counts describe the dataset, not the signs.

1 more on the couples page. All famous couples, each scored from both birth charts.

Both signs in one chart

The two signs also meet inside one chart, when the Sun is in one and the Moon in the other. Astrologers read a Sun and Moon opposite signs the way they read the two Suns above, as an opposition between how a person is seen and how they feel.

Only people whose Sun and Moon signs do not depend on an unknown birth time are counted. The Moon in Capricorn and the Moon in Cancer have pages of their own.

Questions people ask

Are Cancer and Capricorn compatible?

By Sun sign alone, astrology reads Cancer and Capricorn as an opposition, opposite signs: water and earth, both cardinal. That is a reading of one placement of ten and not a verdict on two people. In StarMap's dataset of famous couples, 7 are Cancer and Capricorn, against about 6.1 that chance would give, a ratio of 1.14. The angles between two whole charts, Moon to Moon and Venus to Mars among them, say more than the Sun signs can; the comparison is free on StarMap.

How many famous couples are Cancer and Capricorn?

7 of the 537 couples in StarMap's dataset with both Sun signs certain, Marlene Dietrich and Yul Brynner, Ariana Grande and Mac Miller and Pamela Anderson and Adil Rami among them. Chance alone would give about 6.1, which makes it the 41st most common pairing of the 78. Their sky match, from the angles between the two charts, averages 65 out of 100 against 67 for every couple counted.

Who has the Sun in Cancer and the Moon in Capricorn?

16 people in StarMap's dataset have the Sun in Cancer and the Moon in Capricorn, Anthony Bourdain, Kevin De Bruyne and John Glenn among them. 21 people in StarMap's dataset have the Sun in Capricorn and the Moon in Cancer, Catherine, Princess of Wales, Janis Joplin and Robert Duvall among them. The Moon's sign depends on the day and often on the hour of birth, so only people whose Moon sign is certain are counted.

Sun signs are computed from the Sun’s position with the astronomy-engine ephemeris, checked against Swiss Ephemeris, in the tropical zodiac. Birth data and relationship data come from Wikidata; birth times, where StarMap has one, from Astro-Databank with their Rodden rating. A couple is counted only when the Sun was in one sign for the whole of each birth date. Readings describe what the tradition assigns to an angle, for entertainment and self-reflection; StarMap predicts nothing. Compare two whole charts.

Photo credits (18 photos from Wikimedia Commons)

Each link opens the photo’s page on Wikimedia Commons, which states its author and licence.