Chinese New Year 2018. New Year's Day itself was traditionally named Yuandan (Chinese: 元旦; pinyin: Yuándàn), literally "the first sunrise", but in 1913 the recently established Republic of China government appropriated that name to refer instead to New Year's Day in the newly adopted Gregorian Calendar, with Chinese New Year instead being called "Spring Festival" (Chinese: 春节; pinyin: Chūnjié), which remains the official name for the New Year's Day public holiday in both mainland China and Taiwan. Now, Yuandan refers to the first day of one year according to solar calendar[9] and it is the same day with western New Year's Day in spite of the time difference. Prior to 1913, "Spring Festival" instead referred to lichun, (February 4 or 5), the first solar term in a Chinese calendar year, which marked the end of winter and start of spring.
An alternative name for Chinese New Year's Day means literally "the first day of the (great) year" (Chinese: (大)年初一; pinyin: (Dà) Nián Chūyī). The New Year's Day public holiday in Hong Kong and Macau is named in Chinese, as literally "First Day of the Year in the Agricultural Calendar" (Chinese: 农历年初一; pinyin: Nónglì Nián Chūyī) while the official English name is "The First Day of Lunar New Year".