Lunar New Year in Photos and Video: Revelers Welcome Year of the Horse

Revelers Welcome Year of the Horse With Fireworks and FeastsIn pictures and videoA light installation depicting a Fire Horse appears next to Zhengyang Gate Tower in Beijing.Credit...Maxim Shemetov/ReutersRevelers Welcome Year of the Horse With Fireworks and FeastsIn pictures and videoA light installation depicting a Fire Horse appears next to Zhengyang Gate Tower in Beijing.Credit...Maxim Shemetov/ReutersSKIP Feb. 17, 2026With fireworks, lion dancing, temple visits and even robots, more than a billion people across Asia and in diaspora communities welcomed the Year of the Horse on Tuesday.The Lunar New Year marks the arrival of spring and the first new moon of the lunisolar calendar. It is the most important holiday in many Asian countries and is known as Spring Festival in China, Seollal in South Korea, and Tet in Vietnam.Traditions vary across and within countries, but common threads run throughout: family gatherings with marathon feasts, and rituals to honor ancestors and seek prosperity. Many people flock to temples to make offerings of traditional food, and light incense at altars for ancestors and elders.In South Korea, families ate rice cake soup and wore traditional hanboks. In Vietnam, people bought potted kumquat trees, symbols of luck and good fortune. Across Southeast Asia, dragon dances, believed to bring prosperity and rain, filled the streets.In China, the festival prompted the world’s largest annual migration, with hundreds of millions traveling from major cities to hometowns for reunions.This year’s celebrations also featured an unusual sight: humanoid robots, which appeared at temples and performed martial arts at the Spring Festival Gala, one of the world’s most-watched programs.Here is a look at how people welcomed the Year of the Horse:VideoCreditCredit...CCTV+, via Getty ImagesA drone light show featuring over 2,000 drones illuminated Hong Kong’s skyline.ImageCredit...Lillian Suwanrumpha/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesPraying at Wat Mangkon Kamalawat temple on the eve of the Lunar New Year in Bangkok.VideoCreditCredit...Magdalena Chodownik/Anadolu, via Getty ImagesA lion dance during celebrations in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam.ImageCredit...Chiang Ying-Ying/Associated PressMonks prayed on the eve of Lunar New Year celebrations in Taipei, Taiwan.ImageCredit...Pedro Pardo/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesMolten iron fireworks in a park in Beijing.ImageCredit...Maxim Shemetov/ReutersA humanoid robot danced with robotic dogs at Niangniang Temple in Beijing.ImageCredit...Eduardo Leal/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesA 238-meter-long dragon danced in front of the Government Palace in Macau, China.VideoCreditCredit...Daniel Ceng/Anadolu, via Getty ImagesFireworks lit up the sky in Manila, Philippines.ImageCredit...Robertus Pudyanto/Getty ImagesAn Indonesian devotee burned kim cua paper as he prayed during a Lunar New Year celebration at Kelenteng Hong San Ko Tee temple in Surabaya, Indonesia.ImageCredit...Temilade Adelaja/ReutersA child in Liverpool, England, witnessed a dragon dance during a Lunar New Year procession.ImageCredit...Pavel Bednyakov/Associated PressPeople gathered amid decorations during Lunar New Year celebrations at Manezhnaya Square in Moscow.ImageCredit...Ezra Acayan/Getty ImagesA performer breathed fire during celebrations in the Binondo district of Manila.ImageCredit...Sahiba Chawdhary/ReutersMembers of the Shining Star Lion dance group rested during a practice session in Kolkata, India.VideoCreditCredit...Firdaus Wajidi/Anadolu, via Getty ImagesWorshipers at a temple in Tangerang, Indonesia.ImageCredit...Clodagh Kilcoyne/ReutersLingqian Zheng, 7, and Yuheng Chen, 9, held hobby horses as they met Braden, a horse from Ireland’s Garda mounted police unit, at a school playground in Dublin.ImageCredit...Tingshu Wang/ReutersSpring Festival decorations at an outdoor market in Beijing.ImageCredit...Ajeng Dinar Ulfiana/ReutersA costumed performer rode a flyboard in Jakarta, Indonesia.VideoCreditCredit...Thanh Hue/Getty ImagesVendors prepared boiled chickens in Ho Chi Minh City.ImageCredit...Dmitri Lovetsky/Associated PressA ritual bonfire during the Dugzhuuba, a Buddhist purification rite held ahead of the Lunar New Year, near the Datsan Gunzechoinei Buddhist Temple in St. Petersburg, Russia.ImageCredit...Sai Aung Main/Agence France-Presse — Getty ImagesPeople prayed at a temple in the Chinatown area of Yangon, Myanmar.VideoCreditCredit...Bloomberg Video, via Getty ImagesCrowds at a train station in Shanghai.ImageCredit...Tatan Syuflana/Associated PressA worshiper at Thang Temple on the outskirts of Jakarta, Indonesia.ImageCredit...Tyrone Siu/ReutersA worshiper lit incense at a temple on the eve of the Lunar New Year in Hong Kong.ImageCredit...Binsar Bakkara/Associated PressWorkers installed ornaments at a temple in Deli Serdang, North Sumatra, Indonesia.SKIP