Birthstones by Month: 14 Lists Compared

Birthstones by month: January garnet, February amethyst, March aquamarine, April diamond, May emerald, June pearl, July ruby, August peridot, September sapphire, October opal, November topaz or citrine, December turquoise. Those stones appear on 13 or 14 of the 14 lists we read.

Eight months have the same first stone on every list, where "first stone" means the first one a page names. We read 14 pages on November 7, 2026 to see where the other four split.

What are the birthstones by month?

The table shows how many of the 14 pages name each stone. A stone marked 14 is on every page we read. The pages are two trade bodies (Jewelers of America and the American Gem Society), one lab (GIA), seven jewelers, three publishers and one crystal shop.

October and November are ties: each of their two stones is on 13 lists. Opal comes first on 10 pages and tourmaline on 4. Topaz and citrine tie 7 to 7 for first.

Where do the 14 lists disagree?

Extra stones come in part from updates to the official list in 1952, 2002 and 2016, and pages differ on which stones they include. Six months have an extra stone on at least one list. Here is each split, with who says what.

March. Aquamarine is on all 14. Bloodstone is on 6, including the American Gem Society, Geology.com and the Old Farmer's Almanac.

June. Pearl is on 13 lists. Alexandrite is on 11 and moonstone on 8. Moonstone is on both trade bodies. Borsheims says June has three official birthstones: pearl, alexandrite and moonstone. Monica Vinader lists moonstone alone.

August. Peridot is on all 14. Spinel is on 8 pages, including Jewelers of America, the American Gem Society and GIA. Sardonyx is on 6, including the American Gem Society and Geology.com.

October. Opal and tourmaline are each on 13 lists. Opal comes first on 10 pages and tourmaline first on 4. Q Evon is the only page that adds aquamarine.

November. Topaz and citrine are each on 13 lists, and they tie for first place: 7 pages put citrine first, 7 put topaz first. Q Evon alone adds tiger's eye.

December. Turquoise is on all 14. Tanzanite is on 11, zircon on 10 and blue topaz on 4 (Jewelers of America, Borsheims, Q Evon and Brilliant Earth). Mindful Souls is the only page with lapis lazuli. Borsheims says "Those born during December have multiple birthstones to choose from".

Is there an official birthstone list?

Yes. Jewelers of America says "The official birthstone list dates back to 1912 when it was established by the American National Retail Jewelers Association". That group is now Jewelers of America.

The list has changed. National Jeweler says it was updated in 1952 "to add alexandrite (June), citrine (November), tourmaline (October) and zircon (December)". It says the list changed again "in 2002, when tanzanite became a birthstone for December."

The last change we found is spinel for August in 2016. Jewelers of America's spinel page says spinel was added as an August birthstone in 2016. The American Gem Society says that year August joined June and December as one of the three months with three different gemstones.

That history fits the table. June, August and December all received an addition after 1912, and the American Gem Society counts three stones for each. October (tourmaline) and November (citrine) gained a stone in 1952 too. The six months with one stone on every page are January, February, April, May, July and September.

How hard is each birthstone?

This matters if you give a ring. We found one page that gives a hardness for almost every stone, Whiteflash, so the table uses it. Pearl is not on that page, so its figure is from Mindful Souls. Whiteflash is a jeweler, and this table rests on that one page. Higher numbers on the Mohs scale mean harder to scratch.

Whiteflash gives every figure except pearl. Other pages give slightly different ranges, so treat them as a guide. Whiteflash says "Opal is soft and porous at 5 to 6.5". Mindful Souls puts pearl at only 2.5 to 4.5.

Which stone should you pick for a gift?

This part is our advice. The lists do not say it.

For a month with one stone, there is nothing to decide. If you are buying for a June, October, November or December birthday, pick the stone more lists name where one leads: pearl for June and turquoise for December. October (opal or tourmaline) and November (topaz or citrine) are ties, so pick the one the person likes.

Think about how the person wears jewelry. Pearl, opal and turquoise have the lowest numbers in the table, so a pendant or earrings is the easier format than a daily ring. Our guide to telling real pearls from fake helps if you shop for June.

If two lists disagree, check the stone against the Jewelers of America list, which is the official one. Many jewelers name more than one stone for the same month, as the table shows. Name the stone on the card so nobody argues about it. Our birthday card guide has lines to start from.

Want the flower version too? We compared 12 lists in birth flowers by month.

For a stone you can wear, see our birthstone necklace picks, our Etsy birthday gift picks and our personalized jewelry picks. Those guides carry Etsy affiliate links. This page has none.

How we compared the 14 lists

We took the 10 results Google showed in the US for "birthstones by month" on November 7, 2026. We read nine of them. We did not read the tenth, a Pinterest result. We added the two trade bodies, GIA, the Old Farmer's Almanac and Whiteflash. We read 14 list pages. The agta.org page returned a 404 and the Jewelers of America gift guide page did not load, so neither is counted. Four more pages (the Jewelers of America and American Gem Society stone pages and two National Jeweler articles) gave the history, and we did not count them as lists.

For each page we wrote down every stone it names per month. "First stone" means the first one named, or the modern column where a page has one. We counted the name each page prints, so a stone on two lines of one page counts once.

The pages disagree on a few facts. Mindful Souls dates the standard list to 1921, while Jewelers of America, Geology.com and others say 1912. The counts show who says what. They do not show which list is right.