Most people find out their birthstone once, as a kid, and then forget it until the moment they need to buy something for someone they love. Then they are standing in front of a colour chart at 11pm trying to remember whether their mother was born before or after the twenty-first.
This is the chart. All twelve months, the stone, the colour it actually is in real life, and what the stone has traditionally stood for. No scrolling through a slideshow.
What is a birthstone?
A birthstone is a gemstone assigned to a calendar month. Wearing the stone of your birth month is one of the oldest personalisation ideas in jewellery, and it predates jewellery as an industry.
The tradition is usually traced to the breastplate of Aaron described in the Book of Exodus, which held twelve stones for the twelve tribes of Israel. Somewhere between the first and fifth centuries, writers began linking those stones to the twelve months and the twelve signs of the zodiac. People wore all twelve, rotating them month by month.
The list most Americans use today is far younger than that. It was standardised in 1912 by the National Association of Jewelers, and it has been revised a handful of times since, most recently in 2016 when spinel was added to August. That matters for one practical reason: some months have more than one correct answer, and neither is wrong.
The complete birthstone chart
| Month | Stone | Colour | Traditionally means |
|---|---|---|---|
| January | Garnet | Deep red | Constancy, safe return |
| February | Amethyst | Purple | Clear thinking, calm |
| March | Aquamarine | Pale sea blue | Courage, safe passage |
| April | Diamond | Clear white | Endurance, lasting love |
| May | Emerald | Deep green | Renewal, patience |
| June | Pearl, moonstone, alexandrite | Cream, pale blue-white | Sincerity, new beginnings |
| July | Ruby | Rich red | Passion, protection |
| August | Peridot, spinel | Olive green | Strength, good humour |
| September | Sapphire | Royal blue | Loyalty, honesty |
| October | Opal, tourmaline | Pink, iridescent | Hope, imagination |
| November | Topaz, citrine | Golden yellow | Warmth, generosity |
| December | Turquoise, tanzanite, zircon | Sky blue | Friendship, luck |
Why do some months have more than one stone?
Because availability changed and the lists were revised. June, October, November and December each carry two or three official stones, and December carries the most of any month.
The reason is commercial rather than mystical. When the 1912 list was written, some of the original stones were rare, expensive, or difficult to cut consistently. Later revisions added alternatives that were easier to source. Alexandrite joined June, citrine joined November, tanzanite joined December in 2002, and spinel joined August in 2016.
If you are buying for someone with a multi-stone month, pick by colour, not by rank. Nobody has ever been disappointed to receive the wrong one of two correct stones. What people notice is whether the colour looks like them.
How do you choose when there are several people?
This is the real question behind most birthstone searches. The person is not shopping for their own stone. They are shopping for a piece that holds two, three or five people at once, and they want to know how many is too many.
Three things we have learned from how people actually order:
Order by birth, not by preference. Left to right, oldest to youngest. It removes the decision, and it means you can add to it later without redoing the arrangement. A piece that starts with two stones and gains a third when a baby arrives tells a story that a piece bought complete never will.
Four is the visual limit on a necklace. Past four charms on one chain, the individual stones stop reading as people and start reading as pattern. If you need five or more, split across two pieces or move to a bracelet, where the eye travels along a line instead of clustering at a point.
Repeat colours are fine. Two children born in the same month is common, and two identical stones side by side reads as intentional. People worry about this far more than they need to.
Which stones look best together?
You do not get to choose. That is the point of the piece.
The combination is whoever your people are, and a garnet next to an olive peridot next to a sky blue turquoise is not a palette anyone would design on purpose. It looks the way a family looks. The people who try to make their birthstone piece colour coordinated usually end up leaving someone out, and then it stops being the thing they wanted.
The one design decision worth making is the metal. Warm gold flatters the reds, oranges and greens. Cooler silver sharpens the blues and clear stones. If your set skews blue and clear, silver will make the colours read brighter.
Are birthstones worth buying as a gift?
They work as a gift for a specific reason: the recipient cannot receive it and think it was picked off a shelf.
Personalised gifts are one of the few categories where the recipient can see the effort before they see the object. A stone for each of her children means someone had to know the months. That is a small piece of information, but it is proof of attention, and attention is what most people are actually trying to give.
It is also the rare gift that survives the year it was given. A candle is gone in six weeks. Flowers are gone in nine days. A piece with her people on it gets worn on ordinary Tuesdays, which is the highest compliment a gift can receive.
Birthstone jewellery at everlind
Our birthstone pieces are built one stone at a time. You choose the chain, then add a charm in the colour for each month that matters, and the piece is assembled to that order before it ships. Nothing is pre-made and relabelled.
All twelve colours are available across the range, including the alternates for the multi-stone months, so a June birthday can be pale moonstone white and a December birthday can be sky blue rather than a compromise.
You can see the full range in the birthstone collection, and if you are choosing for more than one person, the product page shows the piece update as you add each stone, so you see the real arrangement before you order.
Frequently asked questions
What is the rarest birthstone?
Alexandrite, one of June's three stones, is the rarest of the traditional birthstones. Natural alexandrite of gem quality is scarcer than natural diamond, which is why lab-created and simulated versions are far more common in jewellery.
Can you wear a birthstone that is not your own?
Yes, and most people who buy birthstone jewellery do exactly that. The stones on a piece usually belong to the wearer's children, partner or parents rather than the wearer. The older superstition that wearing another month's stone brings bad luck has no basis and is not something the jewellery trade has ever taken seriously.
What is the difference between a modern and a traditional birthstone?
The modern list is the 1912 American standard with its later revisions, and it is what nearly every US retailer uses. Traditional lists vary by culture and century. Where they differ, the modern list is the safe default for a gift.
How many birthstones can go on one necklace?
Up to four sits comfortably on a standard chain and stays readable as individual people. Five or more is better split across two pieces or moved to a bracelet.
Do birthstones have meanings?
Each stone carries a traditional association, listed in the chart above. These come from centuries of folklore rather than from any verified property of the stone. They are worth knowing because they make a nice line in a card, not because they do anything.
What is the birthstone for September?
Sapphire, in royal blue. September is one of the single-stone months, so there is no alternate to choose between.
Where to start
If you know the months, you already have everything you need. Start with the person you would put first, add the rest in birth order, and stop when the piece looks like the people it is for.
