The two most similar are the Taiji Xiantiandao and wujitu (無極圖; wújítú) diagrams, both of which have been extensively studied since the Qing period for their possible connection with Zhou Dunyi's taijitu.

[2] Ming period author Lai Zhide simplified the taijitu to a design of two interlocking spirals with two black-and-white dots superimposed on them, became synonymous with the Yellow River Map.

[3][further explanation needed] This version was represented in Western literature and popular culture in the late 19th century as the "Great Monad",[4] this depiction became known in English as the "yin-yang symbol" since the 1960s.

During the Mongol Empire and Yuan dynasty, Taoist traditions and diagrams were compiled and published in the encyclopedia Shilin Guangji by Chen Yuanjing.

Zhou's key terms Wuji and Taiji appear in the opening line 無極而太極, which Adler notes could also be translated "The Supreme Polarity that is Non-Polar".

Zhu Xi (12th century) insists that Zhou Dunyi had composed the diagram himself, against the prevailing view that he had received it from Daoist sources.

Zhu Xi could not accept a Daoist origin of the design, because it would have undermined the claim of uniqueness attached to the Neo-Confucian concept of dao.

[11] While Zhou Dunyi (1017–1073) popularized the circular diagram,[15] the introduction of "swirling" patterns first appears in the Ming period and representative of transformation.

The dots in the modern "yin-yang symbol" have been given the additional interpretation of "intense interaction" between the complementary principles, i.e. a flux or flow to achieve harmony and balance.

Patterns containing ornament looking like Taijitu from archeological artifacts of that culture were displayed in the Ukraine pavilion at the Expo 2010 in Shanghai, China.

While this design appears to become a standard ornamental motif in Iron-Age Celtic culture by the 3rd century BC, found on a wide variety of artifacts, it is not clear what symbolic value was attached to it.

[38][39] Unlike the Chinese symbol, the Celtic yin-yang lack the element of mutual penetration, and the two halves are not always portrayed in different colors.