Astrology, in plain words

The sky above us

What is a birth chart actually a picture of?

Before any meaning, a birth chart is a piece of astronomy: a map of where the Sun, the Moon and the planets were, seen from the place you were born, at the minute you were born. You need only a handful of sky words to follow everything else on this page.

standing in the middle of a giant glass ball. Everything in the sky seems painted on the inside of the ball, and the ball seems to turn around you once a day.

The words for the sky

How the planets move

The Earth spins once a day (its rotation), which makes the whole sky, and the ascendant, wheel round every 24 hours. The Earth also travels round the Sun once a year (its revolution), which is why the Sun moves through one sign a month.

• Direct motion: a planet moving forward through the signs, the normal way.
• Retrograde motion: a planet that seems to move backwards for a while. It never really reverses; the Earth is simply overtaking it, or being overtaken, like a car on a motorway that seems to slide backwards as you pass it. The Sun and Moon are never retrograde. Rahu and Ketu always move backwards.
• Stationary: the few days when a planet turns from direct to retrograde, or back, and seems to stand still. Tradition treats a stationary planet as especially intense.

The Sun, the Moon and the rest

Astrology uses the bodies you can see with the naked eye: the Sun (a star), the Moon (our satellite) and five planets. Western astrology adds Uranus, Neptune and Pluto (Pluto has been classed as a dwarf planet since 2006 but astrologers still use it), and some add asteroids such as Ceres or Chiron. Vedic astrology does not use these.

Astronomy versus astrology

Astronomy calculates where things are. Astrology interprets what those positions are said to mean. The two share the first step: an ephemeris, a table of planet positions for every day. Astrology uses geocentric positions (seen from Earth), because a birth chart is about a person standing on Earth. Heliocentric positions (seen from the Sun) are what astronomers use for orbits, and a few experimental astrologers use them too.

every position comes from the Swiss Ephemeris, which is built on NASA JPL's planetary data.

Time and place of birth

Why does the exact minute and town matter so much?

A chart needs three facts: date, time and place. The date fixes where the planets are. The time and place together fix which sign was rising, and so every house. Because the sky turns about 1° every 4 minutes, a few minutes can change the ascendant degree, and about two hours changes the rising sign itself.

a photo taken from a moving train. The landscape (the planets) barely changes in a minute, but the window frame (the houses) slides past quickly.

The kinds of clock time

Traps in old Indian birth times

• During the Second World War (1942–45) clocks in India ran one hour ahead ("war time"). A birth then needs an hour taken off.
• Before IST was used everywhere, Kolkata kept its own Calcutta Time (until 1948) and Mumbai its own Bombay Time (until 1955).
• Old certificates often round to the nearest quarter or half hour. "Around 6 in the morning" can be wrong by enough to change the ascendant.

The place

The place gives the latitude (how far north or south) and longitude (how far east or west). Longitude converts clock time to star time; latitude changes how long each sign takes to rise. Near the equator every sign rises in about two hours; far north, some signs rise in under an hour and others take three or more.

Birth time accuracy matters differently for each part of a chart. Planet signs are safe with any time on the right day (except the fast Moon near a sign edge). The ascendant needs the time to within a few minutes. The finest divisional charts need it to within a minute or two (the rectification chapter explains what to do when you are not sure).

your town is looked up for its latitude and longitude, and your time is converted with the international time-zone database, which includes India's wartime clock change.

Two zodiacs: tropical and sidereal

Why is my Vedic sign different from my newspaper sign?

Both systems cut the same band of sky into twelve 30° signs. They disagree only on where to start counting.

Precession: why they drift apart

The Earth wobbles slowly on its axis like a spinning top, one full wobble every 25,800 years or so. Because of it, the spring equinox slides backwards against the stars by about 1° every 72 years. This is the precession of the equinoxes. Around 1,700 years ago the two zodiacs lined up; today they are about 24° apart, which is why most people's Vedic Sun sign is one sign earlier than their Western one.

two people walking round a track who started together. One walks very slightly slower, and every lap the gap grows by a step.

Ayanamsha: the size of the gap

The gap between the two zodiacs is the ayanamsha. Everyone agrees it exists, but not on its exact size, because each school picks a different star as the anchor:

A different ayanamsha moves every planet by the same small amount. It only changes a reading when a planet or the ascendant sits close to the edge of a sign or nakshatra.

Ephemeris and planetary longitude

An ephemeris lists each planet's longitude for every day. Modern software computes it from orbital models instead of printed tables. A sidereal position is simply the tropical one minus the ayanamsha: Sun at 10° tropical Leo, minus 24°, is 16° sidereal Cancer.

charts use the sidereal zodiac with the Lahiri (Chitrapaksha) ayanamsha.

How a chart is cast and drawn

What happens between "born 7:45 in Jaipur" and a kundali?

The steps of the calculation

• Julian Day is a single count of days since noon on 1 January 4713 BC. Astronomers use it because it has no months, leap years or calendar changes to trip over. 1 January 2000 at noon is day 2,451,545.
• The ascendant comes from local sidereal time (star time at your longitude) and your latitude, using spherical trigonometry: which degree of the ecliptic is crossing the eastern horizon right then.
• Houses: most Vedic astrologers use whole-sign houses: the rising sign is the whole 1st house, the next sign the whole 2nd, and so on. Other systems cut the houses at exact degrees (see Bhava Chalit below, and Placidus in the KP chapter).
• Planetary degrees: each planet's longitude gives its sign (every 30°), its degree in the sign, its nakshatra (every 13°20′) and pada (every 3°20′).

Four ways to draw the same chart

All four show exactly the same information. Pick the one you were brought up with.

Rashi, Bhava and Chalit charts

• Rashi chart: the ordinary birth chart (D1), showing which sign each planet is in.
• Bhava chart: a chart of the houses measured from the exact ascendant degree. The middle of each house (bhava madhya) is 30° apart, starting at the ascendant degree.
• Chalit chart (Bhava Chalit): the rashi chart redrawn so that a planet near a sign edge can move into the next or previous house, while keeping its sign. Astrologers check it when a planet sits at the very beginning or end of a sign.

charts are drawn North-Indian style with whole-sign houses, from the Swiss Ephemeris and the Lahiri ayanamsha.

The 9 planets (Grahas)

Who or what creates the influence?

Vedic astrology works with nine "planets", called grahas, a word that means "those that grab hold of you". Seven are real bodies you can see in the sky: the Sun, the Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn. The other two, Rahu and Ketu, are not objects at all. They are the two points where the Moon's path crosses the Sun's path, the points where eclipses happen, so tradition treats them as "shadow planets". Uranus, Neptune and Pluto are not used.

Each planet stands for one kind of energy, and the same planet always means the same thing in every chart. Each one also rules one or two signs, has a sign where it is at its strongest, and a day of the week named after it (Sunday for the Sun, Monday for the Moon, and so on).

a play with nine actors. Each actor always plays the same character. How well they perform depends on the costume (the sign) and the stage (the house) they are given.

Tradition also sorts the planets from gentle to harsh. Benefics (Jupiter, Venus, a bright Moon) tend to help and soften whatever they touch. Malefics (Saturn, Mars, Rahu, Ketu, and mildly the Sun) tend to test, delay or cut. Mercury has no nature of its own and takes on the colour of the planets beside it. "Harsh" does not mean bad: Saturn's delays build patience, and Mars's heat builds courage.

Each planet at a glance

Every planet is a karaka, a "significator": it naturally stands for certain people, body parts and things in every chart. These are the meanings tradition gives them:

Two more ideas belong here. A planet's natural meaning (Jupiter is always wisdom) is different from its functional meaning in your chart: what it does because of the houses it rules there (the house lords chapter). And tradition gives each planet an age of maturity, when its promise is said to ripen: Jupiter 16, Sun 22, Moon 24, Venus 25, Mars 28, Mercury 32, Saturn 36, Rahu 42 and Ketu 48 are the ages commonly quoted.

every planet's sign, house and strength is on your Kundali Overview.

The 12 signs (Rashis)

How does the influence behave?

Picture the sky as a big circle around the Earth. The path the Sun, Moon and planets travel along is divided into twelve equal slices of 30 degrees, called rashis or signs, starting from Aries. Whichever sign a planet is in colours the way it behaves. Mars in careful Virgo fights with planning; Mars in bold Aries charges straight in.

Vedic astrology measures the signs against the fixed stars (the sidereal zodiac), so its signs sit about 24 degrees behind the ones in newspaper horoscopes. That is why many people find their "Vedic sign" is the one before their Western sign.

the costume an actor wears. The same actor gives a very different performance in a soldier's uniform than in a poet's robe.

Every sign is a mix of two simple ideas. Its element says what it is made of: fire is energetic and bold, earth is practical and steady, air is social and thinking, water is feeling and caring. Its mode says how it moves: movable signs start things, fixed signs keep things going, dual signs adapt. Put the two together and you get each sign's character.

Each sign at a glance

Odd signs (Aries, Gemini, Leo…) are masculine: outgoing and active. Even signs (Taurus, Cancer, Virgo…) are feminine: receptive and steady. Tradition also maps the signs onto the body of a cosmic person, the Kalapurusha, from Aries at the head to Pisces at the feet.

Signs are also grouped by the creature they picture: human signs (Gemini, Virgo, Libra, Aquarius and the first half of Sagittarius), four-footed signs (Aries, Taurus, Leo, the second half of Sagittarius, the first half of Capricorn), water signs in this sense (Cancer, Pisces, the second half of Capricorn) and the insect sign, Scorpio. The grouping is used in some yogas and in the Vashya test of marriage matching. Rahu and Ketu have no sign of their own; most texts exalt Rahu in Taurus and Ketu in Scorpio, some in Gemini and Sagittarius.

your Moon sign, Sun sign and rising sign are on the cover of your report.

The 27 lunar mansions (Nakshatras)

What is the finer pattern?

The same circle of sky is also cut into 27 smaller slices, each 13°20′ wide, called nakshatras or lunar mansions. They are older than the signs, and they follow the Moon: it moves through about one nakshatra a day, so each one is a night's "lodging" for the Moon. Because 27 slices do not divide evenly into 12 signs, each sign holds two and a quarter nakshatras, and some nakshatras sit across two signs.

zooming in on a map. The sign tells you the city, the nakshatra tells you the neighbourhood, and the pada tells you the street.

Every nakshatra has a ruling planet, and the rulers follow a fixed order of nine that repeats three times round the sky: Ketu, Venus, Sun, Moon, Mars, Rahu, Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury. This same order is the order of the dashas in the dashas chapter, which is why the Moon's nakshatra at birth decides which planet's period you are born into.

Each nakshatra is split again into 4 padas (quarters) of 3°20′, so there are 27 × 4 = 108 padas in all, one reason 108 is a sacred number in India. Each pada also lines up with one sign of the navamsa (D9) chart, so the pada of a planet tells you where it falls in the D9.

the nakshatra and pada of every planet are on your Kundali Overview.

The 12 houses (Bhavas)

Where in your life does it happen?

The houses are twelve areas of life. They are fixed to the moment of birth by the ascendant (or lagna): the sign that was rising on the eastern horizon when you were born. That sign becomes your 1st house, the next sign your 2nd house, and so on round the circle. Because the Earth turns, the sky seems to turn too, and a new sign rises about every two hours. That is why two people born on the same day, a few hours apart, have completely different charts, and why your birth time matters so much.

twelve rooms in a house. The planets are the people; the house number tells you which room they are standing in: the kitchen (money), the office (career), the bedroom (marriage).

In the North Indian chart used across India, the houses never move: house 1 is always the diamond at the top, and the houses count anticlockwise from there. What changes from person to person is which sign sits in each house.

Houses also come in families. The kendras (1, 4, 7, 10) are the pillars that hold a life up. The trikonas (1, 5, 9) are the houses of luck and purpose. The dusthanas (6, 8, 12) are the houses of hard lessons. The upachayas (3, 6, 10, 11) are houses that get better with time and effort.

More families of houses

Finally the twelve houses fall into four groups of three for the four aims of life, the purusharthas:

The lagnas: different starting points

Why count the houses from the ascendant, and from what else?

The lagna (ascendant) is the rising sign. It is the starting point for every house, because it is the one point of the chart that is personal to the minute and place of birth: two babies born an hour apart in the same hospital share planets but not lagnas. The lagna stands for you: your body, temperament and the lens through which you live everything else.

The planet that rules the rising sign, the lagna lord, is the most personal planet in the chart. Where it goes, your attention goes. A strong lagna lord is read as a strong constitution and a life you steer yourself.

the front door of a house. Every room is numbered from the front door, and a few special readings number the rooms from a different door to see the house from another angle.

Other starting points

The rule of three is common practice: a result promised from the lagna, the Moon and the Sun together is the strongest; a result seen from only one of them is weaker.

your lagna, Moon sign and Sun sign are on the Kundali Overview.

How planets interact

How do they work together, or against each other?

Planets rarely act alone, and the same two planets can mean very different things depending on where they meet. Mars and Venus together in the 7th house is about passion in marriage; the same pair in the 10th house is about drive and charm at work. There are three big ideas here: how planets see each other, how comfortable each one is where it sits, and whether they are friends.

1. Seeing: aspects

A planet influences the houses it "looks at", called its aspect or drishti. Every planet looks straight across the chart at the 7th house from itself. Three planets have extra, special aspects: Mars also looks at the 4th and 8th, Jupiter at the 5th and 9th, and Saturn at the 3rd and 10th. Planets sitting together in one house are in conjunction: they mix like colours of paint.

2. Comfort: dignity

Every planet has one sign where it is exalted (at its very strongest), one or two own signs where it is at home, and one sign where it is debilitated (at its weakest). The debilitation sign is always exactly opposite the exaltation sign. A weak planet is not a disaster: tradition has rules, like Neecha Bhanga, that can "cancel" the weakness.

3. Friendship

Planets have natural friendships too. The Sun, Moon, Mars and Jupiter form one "team"; Mercury, Venus and Saturn form another. A planet sitting in a friend's sign is happier than one sitting in an enemy's sign.

Aspects in more detail

• Rahu and Ketu: traditions differ. Many give them the 5th, 7th and 9th aspects (like Jupiter); some only the 7th; some none at all.
• Graha drishti (planet aspects, above) comes from Parashara. The Jaimini school also uses rashi drishti, where whole signs aspect each other (see the Jaimini chapter).
• Aspect strength: Parashara gives the 7th aspect full strength and the others partial strength (three-quarters, half, quarter) for every planet except the three with special aspects, whose special aspects count in full.
• Aspects to the lagna, the Moon, a house and its lord are read separately. Jupiter's aspect on the lagna or the Moon is one of the most protective features a chart can have.

the aspects on your chart are drawn when you open "Meaning" beside a chart.

Friends, dispositors and exchanges

Who is helping whom in my chart?

Three layers of friendship

The natural friendships are fixed for everyone. Parashara adds a second layer that depends on your chart, then combines the two.

• Natural (naisargika): the permanent list. The Sun's friends are the Moon, Mars and Jupiter; its enemies Venus and Saturn; Mercury is neutral. And so on for each planet.
• Temporary (tatkalika): planets in the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, 10th, 11th or 12th sign from a planet are its temporary friends (they sit "near" and support it). Planets in the same sign, or in the 5th to 9th, are temporary enemies.
• Compound (panchadha): add the two together.

The compound relationship decides how comfortable a planet is in another planet's sign, and feeds the strength scores.

Dispositors

The dispositor of a planet is the lord of the sign it sits in: it is the planet's "landlord". Venus in Cancer is disposed by the Moon. A planet can only give what its landlord allows, so a planet in a weak dispositor's sign is like a guest in a struggling household.

Follow the landlords and you get a dispositor chain:

When every chain in a chart ends at one planet in its own sign, that planet is the final dispositor: the boss of the whole chart, whose condition colours everything.

Exchanges (parivartana)

When two planets sit in each other's signs (Mars in Taurus and Venus in Aries), they have swapped houses: a parivartana yoga or mutual reception. Each acts as if it were at home, and the two houses they rule become tightly linked. An exchange between two good houses (kendras and trikonas) is a strong yoga; one involving the 6th, 8th or 12th mixes struggle into the other house.

Conjunctions

Planets in the same sign are conjunct, and they blend like colours of paint. The closer their degrees, the stronger the blend.

• Two planets: read both natures together. Moon + Jupiter (Gaja Kesari) is wise and kind; Moon + Saturn is serious and dutiful.
• Three or more (a stellium): that house becomes the centre of the life, and the strongest planet in the group leads.
• Benefic with malefic: the benefic softens, the malefic toughens. Who wins depends on strength and dignity.
• Functional benefic with functional malefic: the lord of a good house joined to the lord of a hard house mixes their results.
• With the Sun: a planet very close to the Sun is combust (the dignity chapter gives the distances).
• With Rahu or Ketu: the node amplifies (Rahu) or detaches (Ketu) the planet. With the Sun or Moon this forms Grahan Yoga (the doshas chapter).
• Within 1° of each other (two of Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn): a planetary war.

House lords

Who is in charge of each house?

Every house holds a sign, and every sign has a ruling planet. So every house has a lord: the planet that rules the sign on it. To read a house, you ask two questions, not one: what is sitting in the house? and where did its lord go? A strong, well-placed lord can deliver the house's results even when the house itself is empty, and a weak lord can hold back a house full of planets.

a shop and its owner. The shop is the house. You look at what is on the shelves, but you also check where the owner is and whether they are having a good day.

Pick a rising sign below and watch every house change owner. Because the rulers are fixed to the signs, knowing just your rising sign tells you the lord of all twelve houses.

A worked example: for Aries rising, the 10th house (career) holds Capricorn, and Capricorn is ruled by Saturn. So "how is my career?" becomes "where is Saturn, and how strong is it?"

Reading one placement

How do I read "Mars in Leo" or "Jupiter in the 10th"?

Every line in a chart is a sentence: a planet (who) in a sign (how) in a house (where). Beginners read one word and stop. A careful reading asks the same short list of questions every time.

Planet in a sign: Mars in Leo

• The planet's nature: Mars is energy, courage, action.
• The sign's nature: Leo is proud, warm, a leader. So: bold, dramatic, wants to lead from the front.
• Dignity: Leo is ruled by the Sun, a friend of Mars, so Mars is comfortable here.
• The sign lord: how strong is the Sun? Mars can only do as well as its landlord allows.
• The house it falls in for this chart, its aspects, its nakshatra (Magha, Purva Phalguni or Uttara Phalguni), its degree (early, middle or late) and its overall strength.

Planet in a house: Jupiter in the 10th

• Natural meaning: Jupiter is wisdom, teaching, growth, advice.
• House meaning: the 10th is career and reputation. So: a career with a teaching, advising or guiding flavour, and a respected name.
• The sign Jupiter is in there (exalted in Cancer for Libra rising; debilitated in Capricorn for Aries rising: the same house, very different results).
• The houses Jupiter rules for this lagna: their matters get pulled into the career.
• The 10th lord: where it sits and how strong it is.
• Aspects on Jupiter, its nakshatra, dignity, strength, any yoga it is part of, and whether its dasha or a transit is switching it on.

House lord analysis: the ten questions

For any house, the most useful habit in Vedic astrology is to follow its lord:

reading a sentence instead of one word. "Mars" tells you little; "a confident Mars, in a friend's sign, in the house of career, looked at by Jupiter, in its own period" tells a story.

Dignity in depth

How comfortable is each planet, exactly?

Dignity is a ladder, from most to least comfortable. A planet higher up the ladder gives its results more fully and more easily.

Neecha Bhanga: when weakness is cancelled

A debilitated planet is not doomed. Its weakness is said to be cancelled, and it can even rise to great strength (Neecha Bhanga Raja Yoga), when for example:

• the lord of the sign it is debilitated in is in a kendra (1, 4, 7, 10) from the lagna or the Moon;
• the planet that is exalted in that same sign is in a kendra from the lagna or the Moon;
• the debilitated planet is aspected by the lord of its sign;
• it is exalted in the navamsa (D9);
• it has exchanged signs with its dispositor.

People with a cancelled debilitation often describe a slow, hard start in that area that turns into real mastery later.

Vargottama and Pushkara

• Vargottama: a planet in the same sign in the D1 and the D9. It is consistent inside and out, and counts as strong, almost like being in its own sign. It happens in the first navamsa of a movable sign, the middle (fifth) of a fixed sign and the last of a dual sign.
• Pushkara navamsha: certain navamsas, two in each sign, that fall in the gentle signs of Jupiter and Venus. A planet there is said to be "nourished".
• Pushkara bhaga: one especially auspicious degree in each sign.

Combustion

A planet very close to the Sun is combust (asta): drowned out by the Sun's light, so its meanings struggle to show or get absorbed into the ego. The usual distances, from the Surya Siddhanta:

Rahu and Ketu are never combust. Mercury is so often near the Sun that many astrologers treat its combustion lightly; a combust Venus or Jupiter is read more seriously. A planet that is both retrograde and combust is close to Earth and bright, and some astrologers say the retrograde strength offsets the combustion.

Retrograde planets

A retrograde planet (vakri) is closest to the Earth and at its brightest, so Vedic texts give it extra strength (cheshta bala), not less. Its expression turns inward, repeats or comes late:

Planetary war (graha yuddha)

When two of Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn come within 1° of each other, they are at war. The texts judge the winner by which planet is further north in the sky or brighter (Venus usually wins). The loser gives weaker results for the houses it rules. The Sun, Moon, Rahu and Ketu do not take part.

Avasthas: a planet's age and mood

Is the planet awake, grown up, happy?

Avasthas are "states". They describe a planet's condition the way you would describe a person: how old, how awake, how happy. They fine-tune how much of its promise a planet can deliver.

Baladi: the age of a planet

Each sign is cut into five 6° parts. In odd signs the ages run forwards, in even signs backwards.

Jagradadi: awake, dreaming, asleep

Deeptadi: the planet's mood

The nine or ten moods below come from Phaladeepika and related texts. The lists differ a little between books, so treat them as descriptions rather than strict rules.

giving a job to someone: you want an adult, awake, in a good mood. A child, a sleeper or an angry person will do part of it, or do it badly.

Planetary strength

How strong is each planet?

Two people can both have Jupiter in the 10th house and still get different results, because one Jupiter is strong and the other is weak. Astrology measures strength in several ways. The biggest is Shadbala, "six strengths", which adds up six separate sources into one score, measured in units called rupas:

Each planet has a minimum it needs to count as strong. A planet above its line can deliver what it promises; one below it struggles to.

Ashtakavarga is a second, simpler score. Each planet gives each sign 0 or 1 point from eight reference points, and the totals give every house a score. Across all twelve houses the total is always 337, so the average is about 28: a house above 28 is supported, one below it has to work harder. It is also used to judge transits.

the same job given to two people: one rested and well equipped, one tired and short of tools. Same job, different results.

Ashtakavarga in depth

How does the eight-point scoring system work?

Ashtakavarga ("eight-fold division") is the most number-friendly system in Vedic astrology. Each of the seven planets is scored in every sign by eight givers: the seven planets and the lagna. Each giver either gives a point (a bindu, a dot) or does not (a rekha, a line). Rahu and Ketu are left out in the classical method.

eight judges holding up a yes or no card for every planet in every room. More yes cards, more support.

The three tables

The number of points each planet's table always holds is fixed: Sun 48, Moon 49, Mars 39, Mercury 54, Jupiter 56, Venus 52, Saturn 39, which add up to 337.

How it is read

• Houses: a sign with more than 28 points in the SAV is a supported area of life; under about 25 needs more effort. The 11th house usually scores higher than the 12th; when the 12th scores more, spending tends to outrun income.
• Transits: a planet passing through a sign where its own BAV has 4 or more points tends to give good results there; 3 or fewer, weaker. Saturn crossing a 6-point sign is a very different Saturn from one crossing a 1-point sign.
• Kakshya: each sign is cut into eight slices of 3°45′, ruled in order by Saturn, Jupiter, Mars, the Sun, Venus, Mercury, the Moon and the lagna. A transiting planet gives good results while it is in the slice of a giver that awarded a point there. This pins timing down to weeks.
• Reductions: the classical method reduces the tables (trikona and ekadhipatya shodhana) to get a "pinda" number used for finer timing and the old longevity methods.

the transit table on Dasha Analysis uses each planet's sign support.

Yogas

Which special combinations are there?

A yoga is a named combination: a particular pattern of planets, signs, houses and lords that tradition says produces a particular result. There are hundreds of them. Spotting yogas is pattern recognition, and it is one of the most interesting parts of reading a chart, because it turns separate placements into one story.

a recipe. Flour, sugar and eggs are ordinary on their own; put together the right way they make a cake. A yoga is the recipe that turns separate placements into one result.

Every yoga, in plain words

Below is a library of the named yogas used in Vedic astrology, grouped into eighteen families. Search for a planet, a house or a name, or pick a family. A yoga that belongs to several families (Lakshmi Yoga is a power, wealth and Venus yoga) is shown once, with all its families listed.

every yoga found in your chart, strongest first, is in your report. See also the Manglik Check.

Doshas and afflictions

What do people mean by a "dosha", and should I worry?

A dosha is a "fault": a combination tradition reads as a difficulty in one area. Doshas are often used to frighten people, so three facts first. Many are very common (Manglik Dosha appears in a large share of all charts). Many come with cancellation rules. And several famous ones, such as Kaal Sarp, are not in the classical texts at all and were added much later.

Afflicted houses and planets

Beyond named doshas, astrologers look for affliction: a key house or planet hemmed in, joined or aspected by malefics with no benefic help. Commonly checked: an afflicted Moon (peace of mind), Venus and the 7th house (relationships), the 5th (children and creativity), the 8th (sudden events) and the lagna (health and confidence). Affliction is always weighed against the help the same house receives.

the Manglik Check shows every cancellation rule it tested on your chart.

Reading a nakshatra

How deep can one star go?

A nakshatra is read in layers, by following a chain: the planet, the nakshatra it sits in, that nakshatra's ruling planet, the pada, and the navamsa sign the pada falls in. Each link adds detail to the one before.

Every nakshatra also carries its own set of traits: a presiding deity and a symbol that set its mood, a gana (temperament), a yoni (animal nature), a nadi (constitution), an element and a motivation (duty, wealth, pleasure or freedom). The 27 split evenly into these groups:

Nakshatras matter most for personality, for reading the Moon, for marriage matching, for the dashas, and for choosing a good time to start something (muhurta).

your Moon's nakshatra, gana and pada are in your profile card.

Tara Bala: the nine stars of a day

Is today's star friendly to my birth star?

Your janma nakshatra is the nakshatra your Moon was in at birth. Tara Bala compares it with the nakshatra the Moon is in on any other day. Count from your birth star to the day's star (counting your own as 1), divide by 9, and look at the remainder (a remainder of 0 counts as 9):

The same count is the Tara koota in marriage matching (3 points), where it is done from each partner's star to the other's. It is also used to judge which dasha sub-periods and transits are kind: a planet passing through your 3rd, 5th or 7th tara is read as harder.

Some astrologers watch a few other stars from the birth star too: the 10th (karma), 16th (sanghatika), 18th (samudayika), 23rd (vainashika) and 25th (manasa) nakshatras.

neighbours on your street. Some are friends who help, some are best avoided on an important day.

Divisional charts (Vargas)

Which part of life, in close-up?

Cut every sign into equal parts and cast a new chart from the pieces, and you get a divisional chart. The D1 is the whole life. The D9 (Navamsa) is the most important close-up, for marriage and for how strong each planet really is. Others zoom in on one subject: D10 career, D2 wealth, D7 children, D24 education, D60 karma.

a camera with zoom. D1 is the wide shot of the whole landscape; each divisional chart zooms in on one tree.

The finer the cut, the faster that chart changes as the sky turns, so the more exact your birth time needs to be. A D1 is safe with a birth time that is roughly right. A D60 can change if your birth time is wrong by just two minutes.

The sixteen charts of Parashara

Parashara lists sixteen divisional charts, the Shodashavarga. Smaller sets are used for quick strength checks: the Shadvarga (6), Saptavarga (7) and Dashavarga (10). A planet's dignity across all of them is added into one score out of 20, its Vimshopaka bala.

Other schools add more: D5 (power and authority), D6 (health), D8 (sudden events) and D11 (gains), which is why the home page lists twenty charts.

all twenty explained on the home page; your D1, D9 and D60 are read in the app.

Navamsa (D9) in depth

Why does every astrologer look at the D9 straight after the D1?

The navamsa cuts every sign into nine parts of 3°20′, exactly one nakshatra pada each. It is called the chart of marriage, the chart of dharma (what you are here to grow into), and the chart that shows a planet's real strength. A common saying puts it simply: the D1 is the tree, the D9 is the fruit.

How the D9 is built

The nine parts of a sign are counted from a starting sign set by the element: fire signs start from Aries, earth signs from Capricorn, air signs from Libra, water signs from Cancer. So the first 3°20′ of Taurus (earth) is the Capricorn navamsa, the next the Aquarius navamsa, and so on.

What to look at

• Navamsa lagna and its lord: your inner nature, and in marriage readings the tone of married life.
• Each planet's D9 sign: exalted in D1 but debilitated in D9 promises more than it delivers; debilitated in D1 but exalted in D9 starts weak and ends strong.
• Vargottama planets (same sign in both): reliable and consistent.
• Pushkara navamshas: planets here are nourished and helpful.
• The 7th house of the D9, its lord, Venus and (in a woman's chart, traditionally) Jupiter: the spouse's nature and the quality of the bond.
• D1–D9 comparison: a house lord well placed in both charts gives reliable results; strong in one and weak in the other, mixed ones.

Timing with the D9

A dasha planet that is strong in the D9 gives better results in its period than its D1 position alone suggests. Marriage is often timed when the dasha or sub-period lord is linked to the 7th house of the D1 and the D9. Because the D9 lagna changes about every 13 minutes, the birth time needs to be fairly accurate before reading it closely.

a job interview after the CV. The D1 is the CV, the D9 is how the person actually performs once you meet them.

your D9 is drawn next to your D1 on the Kundali Overview; tap "Meaning".

Dashas

When does it happen?

The chart shows what is promised; the dasha shows when. The main system, Vimshottari, divides a 120-year life into nine periods, one ruled by each planet, always in the same order. While a planet's period runs, its themes, and the houses it rules, come forward in your life.

a school timetable. The chart is the list of subjects; the dasha tells you which subject is being taught this year, and which one comes next.

Where you start in the cycle depends on the nakshatra your Moon was in at birth (the nakshatras chapter): its ruler's period is running when you are born, already partly used up by how far the Moon had travelled through that nakshatra. Then the periods follow in order.

Each period is divided again into nine sub-periods (antardashas), in the same order and the same proportions, starting with the period's own planet. Those are divided again (pratyantardashas), and so on down to a few days. This is how an astrologer moves from "this decade" to "this year" to "this month".

Each level can be divided again the same way. Astrologers name five levels, and the smallest lasts only a few days:

Many dasha systems, not one

Vimshottari is the best known, but it is only one of many timing systems. Some count planets' periods from the Moon's nakshatra, like Vimshottari. Some count signs instead of planets (the Jaimini school's Chara and Narayana). Some are used only when a chart meets a condition: Ashtottari, for instance, when Rahu sits in a particular position. And some run inside a single year, for the annual chart (Tajaka). Their cycles have different lengths:

Below is every system, in plain words. The five most used are marked ★: Vimshottari, Yogini, Chara, Narayana and Kalachakra. For conditional systems the card says what switches them on.

your running period and every change ahead are on Dasha Analysis.

Transits (Gochar)

What is changing right now?

Your birth chart is frozen at one moment, but the planets keep moving. A transit is where a planet is today, compared with your birth chart. Fast planets like the Moon pass through a sign in a couple of days, so their transits colour a day or a mood. Slow planets stay for years, so their transits shape whole chapters of life.

weather passing over your house. The house (your chart) stays the same; the weather changes, and some weather suits some rooms better than others.

The most famous transit is Sade Sati ("seven and a half"): the roughly 7½ years while Saturn passes the sign before your Moon, your Moon's own sign, and the sign after it. It is known as a slow, testing, maturing time, not a doomed one. Many people do their most lasting work in it.

A transit works together with the dasha: a good transit helps most when the running period also promises it.

Good houses for each transit, from the Moon

Transits are read mainly from your Moon sign (Chandra lagna). Tradition lists the houses from the Moon where each planet's transit tends to help:

• Vedha (obstruction): each helpful house has a partner house. If another planet is transiting that partner house at the same time, the good result is blocked. (The Sun and Saturn, and the Moon and Mercury, do not block each other.)
• Dhaiya: Saturn's 2½-year transits of the 4th and 8th houses from the Moon, a "small" version of Sade Sati.
• Returns: Jupiter comes back to its birth sign about every 12 years (ages 12, 24, 36…), a time of renewal; Saturn about every 29½ years (around 29–30 and 58–59), a time of growing up and taking stock.
• Transit plus nakshatra: a slow planet crossing the nakshatra of a birth planet, or a harsh tara from your birth star, sharpens the result.
• Transit plus Ashtakavarga: the score of the sign being crossed (the Ashtakavarga chapter) tells you how kind the transit will be.
• Double transit: a popular rule says a big event (such as marriage) tends to come when both Jupiter and Saturn touch the relevant house or its lord by transit or aspect, during a dasha that promises it.

The annual chart: Tajika and Varshaphala

What will this particular year bring?

Varshaphala ("fruit of the year") is a chart cast for the exact moment each year when the Sun returns to the precise sidereal degree it held at your birth. That moment falls on or within a day of your birthday. The method comes from the Tajika school, which mixed Indian astrology with Persian and Arabic techniques around the 13th century, so it uses Western-style degree aspects.

a yearly report card. The birth chart is your whole school record; the annual chart is this year's results.

The main parts

Tajika aspects and yogas

Tajika aspects work by degree, with an orb (deeptamsha) for each planet: Sun 15°, Moon 12°, Mars 8°, Mercury 7°, Jupiter 9°, Venus 7°, Saturn 9°. The 3rd/11th and 5th/9th are friendly; the 1st/7th and 4th/10th are tense. Sixteen named yogas describe how two planets meet:

The other yogas (Duphali-kuttha, Dutthottha-davira, Tambira, Kuttha, Durupha, Khallasara, Gairi-kamboola) describe finer variations of the same idea: who applies to whom, and whether it is helped or spoiled.

Compatibility

How do two charts fit together?

The best-known test is Ashta Koota ("eight points"), also called Guna Milan. It compares the two people's Moons through eight tests. Each test is worth more points than the one before, because tradition treats the later tests as more important, and the eight add up to 36.

Guna Milan is only one layer. A full reading also looks at the Manglik check, the 7th house and its lord, Venus and Jupiter, the Darakaraka, the Upapada Lagna, the D9, and the dashas both people are running.

try it on Marriage Match.

Marriage in depth

Beyond the 36 points: what does one chart say about marriage?

Guna Milan compares two Moons. A full marriage reading also studies each person's own chart for what it promises about partnership, and when.

The factors, in the order an astrologer checks them

Common questions and what is looked at

Marriage Match reads both charts: the 36 points, Manglik, dashas and the 7th houses.

Special points and karakas

What does an advanced reading add?

Advanced astrology, especially the Jaimini school, uses a second way of naming planets. The chara karakas ("moving significators") are chosen by how far each planet has travelled through its own sign. The planet at the highest degree becomes the Atmakaraka, your soul planet; the lowest becomes the Darakaraka, your partner planet; the others fill the roles in between.

your soul planet and partner planet are explained in the Full report + AI.

Jaimini astrology

What is the "other" classical school?

Most of this page follows Parashara. The Jaimini Sutras, a short and famously cryptic text, describe a second classical system. It shares the planets, signs and houses but adds its own tools, and it works more with signs than with planets. Many astrologers today use both side by side.

Its main tools

Argala in plain words

Planets in the 2nd, 4th and 11th from a house intervene in it (the 5th is a weaker argala). Planets in the 12th, 10th and 3rd respectively obstruct each one (the 9th obstructs the 5th). If the helpers outnumber or outweigh the blockers, the house is supported. Benefic argala helps gently; malefic argala helps by force. Two or more malefics in the 3rd from a house also give strong argala.

friends pushing a stuck car. Some push forward (argala), some stand in front of it (obstruction). The car moves if the pushers win.

Jaimini Raja yogas

• The Atmakaraka and Amatyakaraka joined, or in mutual sign aspect: the soul and its minister work together, a classic sign of rise in status.
• The Atmakaraka joined or aspected by the 5th or 9th lord, or planets in the 1st, 5th, 7th or 9th from the Karakamsha.
• Benefics in the 2nd, 4th and 5th from the Arudha Lagna: the public image is supported.

Chara dasha

The best-known Jaimini timing system runs through the twelve signs, each for 1 to 12 years, worked out from where its lord sits. During a sign's period, life takes on the themes of that sign and of the houses counted from it. The dashas chapter lists it with the other systems.

Arudha padas: your image

Who am I, versus who do people think I am?

A house shows the reality of something. Its arudha ("mounted", like a reflection) shows the perception: what the world sees, believes and responds to. Wealth in the 2nd house is your money; wealth in the arudha of the 2nd is how rich you look. Both matter, because people react to the image.

How to find an arudha

Example: Aries rising; Mars (lord of the 1st) is in the 4th house, Cancer. Count 4 from Aries to Cancer, then 4 more from Cancer: Libra. Libra is the 7th from Aries, so the exception applies: the 10th from Libra is Cancer. The Arudha Lagna is Cancer.

The twelve padas

How they are used

• Fame and status: planets in kendras from the A1 and A10; the 11th from the A1 shows how gains flow in, the 12th from it what drains away.
• Business: the relation between the A1 and the A7 (you and your trading partners).
• Marriage: the Upapada, its lord and the 2nd from it (the marriage's continuation).

a shop's sign board compared with what is inside. A great shop with a poor board gets few customers; a fancy board on an empty shop gets them once.

KP astrology (Krishnamurti Paddhati)

What is the system that splits nakshatras into "subs"?

K. S. Krishnamurti (1908–1972) built a system designed for precise yes/no answers and event timing. It keeps the sidereal zodiac (with its own KP ayanamsha) and the Vimshottari dasha, but changes how houses are drawn and how planets are judged.

Its core ideas

House groups for events

KP judges an event by the houses its significators link: for example a job by the 2nd, 6th, 10th and 11th; marriage by the 2nd, 7th and 11th; a loss or separation by the 6th, 8th and 12th. Timing comes from the dasha, sub-period and transit of the significators.

a postal address. The sign is the city, the nakshatra the street, and the sub the house number. KP insists you read the house number before deciding.

Nadi astrology

What are the palm-leaf readings and the "Nadi" methods?

"Nadi" is used for two different things, and it helps to keep them apart.

1. The palm-leaf libraries

In Tamil Nadu, especially around Vaitheeswaran Koil, families keep bundles of palm-leaf manuscripts said to have been written by sages such as Agastya and Bhrigu. A visitor gives a thumbprint, and readers search for a leaf that matches the person's name and life. These readings are a living tradition; their claims cannot be checked independently.

2. Nadi techniques

The second meaning is a set of methods drawn from Nadi texts, used on an ordinary birth chart. They are not one uniform system.

Panchanga: the five limbs of a day

What is in the Hindu almanac, and what do the words mean?

The panchanga ("five limbs") is the traditional calendar. It describes every day by five measures, all worked out from the Sun and the Moon. It is used to choose good times and to fix the dates of festivals.

Tithis and the fortnights

The lunar month has two fortnights (paksha): Shukla paksha, the bright, waxing half, from new moon to full moon (Purnima), and Krishna paksha, the dark, waning half, back to new moon (Amavasya). Each half has fifteen tithis, from Pratipada (1st) and Dwitiya (2nd) through Ekadashi (11th) to Chaturdashi (14th) and the full or new moon. Tithis fall into five groups that repeat: Nanda (1, 6, 11: joy), Bhadra (2, 7, 12: health), Jaya (3, 8, 13: victory), Rikta (4, 9, 14: "empty", avoided for beginnings) and Purna (5, 10, 15: fullness).

Yogas and karanas

The 27 panchanga yogas (not the same as chart yogas) run from Vishkambha to Vaidhriti; two of them, Vyatipata and Vaidhriti, are avoided for new starts. Of the eleven karanas, seven repeat through the month (Bava, Balava, Kaulava, Taitila, Gara, Vanija and Vishti) and four occur once (Shakuni, Chatushpada, Naga, Kimstughna). Vishti, also called Bhadra, is avoided for auspicious work.

Months and the solar year

• Lunar months are named after the nakshatra near the full Moon: Chaitra, Vaishakha, Jyeshtha, Ashadha, Shravana, Bhadrapada, Ashwin, Kartika, Margashirsha, Pausha, Magha, Phalguna.
• In amanta calendars (much of south and west India) a month ends at new moon; in purnimanta calendars (much of the north) it ends at full moon. That is why the same festival can fall in "different" months.
• Sankranti is the Sun entering a new sign; Makar Sankranti (around 14 January) is the best known.
• Adhik Maas: twelve lunar months are about 11 days short of a solar year, so roughly every 32½ months a lunar month with no Sankranti in it is counted twice as an extra month.

the date on a calendar, but with five readings instead of one, like a weather report giving temperature, wind, rain, humidity and air quality.

Muhurta: choosing a good time

How is an auspicious time picked for a wedding or a launch?

A muhurta is a chosen moment to begin something. The idea is simple: if a birth chart describes a person, then the chart of a beginning describes the thing begun. An astrologer filters the calendar step by step, discarding bad times until a good one is left.

The filters

1. Panchanga: a good tithi (not Rikta), a helpful weekday, a nakshatra suited to the task, no Vyatipata or Vaidhriti yoga, no Vishti karana.
2. Tara Bala and Chandra Bala: the day's star and Moon sign friendly to the person's own.
3. Lagna: a strong rising sign at the chosen minute, with benefics in kendras and the 8th house empty.
4. Time-of-day periods to avoid and to prefer (below).
5. Season: some months are avoided for weddings, such as when Jupiter or Venus is combust ("asta") or the Sun is in Sagittarius or Pisces (kharmas).

Periods of the day

Daylight (sunrise to sunset) is cut into eight equal parts. Three of them are avoided for new starts, a different part each weekday:

With sunrise at 6:00 and sunset at 18:00, each part is 1½ hours, so Monday's Rahu Kaal is 7:30–9:00. On real days the parts stretch and shrink with the length of daylight.

Typical muhurtas

choosing the weather for a picnic. You cannot change the weather, but you can pick a sunny day to begin.

Prashna: the chart of a question

Can astrology answer a question without a birth chart?

A birth chart asks "what does my life hold?". A prashna (horary) chart asks "what is happening with this question right now?". It is cast for the moment a sincere question is asked and understood by the astrologer, so it needs no birth time at all. Kerala has a famous tradition of it, written down in the Prashna Marga.

How a prashna chart is judged

• The question must be clear, specific and sincere. "Will I get this job I interviewed for last week?" works; "tell me about my life" does not.
• The lagna is the person asking; its lord is their main significator.
• The house of the question and its lord: the 7th for marriage or a dispute, the 10th for a job, the 5th for pregnancy, the 2nd for lost money, the 4th for property, the 9th or 12th for travel abroad, the 6th for illness or a lawsuit.
• The Moon shows the flow of the matter; a strong, waxing Moon helps.
• Connection: if the lagna lord and the question's lord meet by aspect or conjunction (an applying link), the matter tends to come together.
• Timing is read from the distance (in degrees) still to go before the link completes, converted to days, weeks or months by the signs involved.

KP astrology has its own horary method using a number from 1 to 249 (the KP chapter), and Western astrology has a long horary tradition of its own (the Western horary chapter).

Career, money and business

Where does a chart show work and wealth?

Every life area is read the same way: the house, its lord, the planets that naturally signify it, the matching divisional chart, the special points, and then the dasha and transits for timing. Here is that recipe for work and money.

Career

Wealth

• The money houses: the 2nd (savings), 11th (income and gains), and the luck houses 5th (speculation and intelligence) and 9th (fortune). Links between their lords form Dhana yogas.
• The planets: Jupiter (expansion, banks), Venus (luxury, comfort), Mercury (trade).
• The charts: D2 (hora; planets in the Sun's hora show self-earned wealth, in the Moon's hora inherited or steady wealth), the D11 in some schools, and the D10 for income from career.
• Sudden gains: the 8th house (inheritance, insurance, windfalls) and Rahu. Losses: the 12th house and its lord, a 12th house stronger than the 11th in Ashtakavarga.
• Property: the 4th house, Mars (land) and the D4.
• Speculation: the 5th house and Rahu. Astrology is not financial advice; no chart makes a trade safe.

Business and entrepreneurship

Business is read from the 7th (partners and the public), 10th (the enterprise), 11th (profit), 2nd (capital) and 3rd (initiative and marketing), with the D10 and the A10. Mercury (trade), Mars (drive), Saturn (scale and staff), Jupiter (finance and advice) and Rahu (innovation, risk, foreign markets) are the key planets. Partnerships need a strong 7th; competitors are the 6th house; expansion is the 11th; brand visibility is the Arudha Lagna and the A10. Good times to start or raise money are dashas of the 10th, 11th and 2nd lords with helpful transits.

Career Focus, Materialism, Ambition and Success Orientation are scored from your chart; open one to see the factors behind it.

Travel, life abroad and the spiritual path

Where does a chart show moving away, and turning inward?

Travel and foreign settlement

The spiritual path

Spiritual life is read from the moksha houses (4, 8, 12), the 9th (faith, guru, dharma), the 5th (mantra, devotion, past merit) and the 8th (the occult and transformation). The key planets are Ketu (detachment), Jupiter (wisdom, the teacher) and Saturn (renunciation and discipline). The D20 is the chart of spiritual practice, and the Atmakaraka and Karakamsha show the soul's direction.

Health and longevity in tradition

What do the texts say about the body, and about lifespan?

Planets and the body

The houses read are the 1st (general health and resilience), 6th (illness and recovery), 8th (chronic or sudden problems) and 12th (hospitals and rest), and the charts are the D6, D30 and D60. Each sign also maps to a body part (the signs chapter). An afflicted planet or sign is read as an area to look after; a dasha of the 6th or 8th lord as a time for extra care.

Longevity (ayurdaya)

The classical texts spend many pages on ayurdaya, estimating lifespan in three bands: Alpayu (short, up to about 32 years), Madhyayu (middle, about 32–64) and Purnayu (full, 64 and beyond; the exact limits differ by text). They use the 8th house and its lord, Saturn, the lagna lord, the D3, D8, D30 and D60, Jaimini's three pairs of factors, and the maraka houses (2 and 7) and badhaka house for danger periods.

the Medical Astrology page reads the classical body links for your chart, as tradition, not medicine.

Karma and past lives

What does tradition say a chart carries from before?

Indian philosophy holds that each life continues the story of earlier ones, and astrology reads that story in symbols. Treat this as a way of thinking about your patterns, not as a record of history.

a school year that continues from last year. Some subjects you already know (Ketu), some you are taking for the first time (Rahu), and the report card from last year (D60) explains why.

the Past Life & Karma page reads your D60, Rahu–Ketu and karmic houses.

Remedies (upayas)

What does tradition suggest when a planet is troubled, and what should I avoid?

Tradition offers upayas, remedies, to steady a troubled planet. Most of them are simple, free and good for you anyway: prayer, discipline, kindness and charity. The expensive ones are the ones to be careful with.

The kinds of remedy

Gemstones

The traditional idea is that a gem strengthens its planet; it does not calm it. So the rule astrologers themselves give is:

• Never strengthen a planet that rules difficult houses for your lagna (for example the lord of the 6th, 8th or 12th), or one that is causing the trouble.
• Gems are usually suggested only for the lagna lord and the lords of good houses (the 5th and 9th) when they are weak.
• Blue sapphire and the Rahu/Ketu stones are treated with special caution.
• A gem is not a cure, and no stone should cost you money you cannot spare.

Rectifying an uncertain birth time

What if I don't know exactly when I was born?

Rectification means working backwards from a life to the minute it began. Astrologers try nearby birth times and keep the one whose chart best matches what has actually happened.

How sensitive each part is

The method

1. Collect dated events: education milestones, first job, marriage, children, moves, accidents or surgery, the passing of a parent, a sibling's marriage.
2. Narrow the rising sign from appearance and temperament, if the time is uncertain by hours.
3. Test each candidate time: do the dashas and sub-periods running at each event match the houses they should (the 7th for marriage, the 10th for a first job, the 4th for a move)?
4. Check transits on those dates (Jupiter and Saturn over the relevant houses).
5. Verify with divisional charts: the D9 for marriage, the D10 for career, the D7 for children, the D12 for parents, and finally the D60.

Schools have their own techniques: KP uses ruling planets at the moment of rectification, Jaimini uses sign dashas, Nadi traditions use the Nadi amsha, and Western astrology uses progressions and the prenatal epoch.

a detective matching a timeline to the evidence. Each event is a clue; the right time is the one that explains every clue at once.

if you are unsure of your time, trust the D1 and Moon-based readings most; the fine charts depend on the minute.

Western astrology: the basics

How is the astrology in magazines different?

Western astrology grew from the same Babylonian and Greek roots as part of Indian astrology, then went its own way. It uses the same twelve signs and houses but differs in four big ways:

The outer planets

Because they move so slowly, everyone born within a few years shares their signs, so astrologers read their house and aspects for the individual and their signs for a generation.

Points

House systems

Western astrologers choose among many ways to cut the houses. Placidus is the most popular today; Whole Sign is the oldest (and the one Vedic astrology uses); Equal, Koch, Porphyry and Regiomontanus (favoured in horary) are others. They agree on the ascendant and differ on where the other houses begin.

Western aspects and chart patterns

What do trines and squares mean?

In Western astrology an aspect is the angle between two planets, measured round the chart. Each angle has a character. Because planets are rarely at an exact angle, an orb (a margin) is allowed: commonly about 8° for the major aspects (a little more when the Sun or Moon is involved) and 2–3° for the minor ones.

An aspect is applying when the faster planet is still moving towards the exact angle (the effect is building) and separating when it has passed (the effect is fading).

Aspect patterns

Chart shapes

The astrologer Marc Edmund Jones named seven overall shapes the planets can make round the wheel:

Western prediction methods

If Western astrology has no dashas, how does it time things?

Western astrologers usually learn to read a birth chart first, then add these timing techniques.

Synastry and relationship charts

How does Western astrology compare two people?

Where Vedic matching scores the two Moons (Guna Milan), Western synastry lays one chart over the other and reads every aspect between them.

Charts of the relationship itself

• Composite chart: the midpoint of each pair of planets (your Sun and theirs, your Moon and theirs…) makes one chart for the relationship as its own living thing.
• Davison chart: a real chart cast for the moment and place exactly halfway between the two births in time and space.

Synastry is read for attraction, emotional and physical compatibility, communication, commitment and long-term stability. As with Guna Milan, no single contact makes or breaks a relationship.

Marriage Match uses the Vedic method: Guna Milan, Manglik and dashas.

Western horary and electional astrology

How does the Western tradition answer questions and pick dates?

Horary

Like prashna, horary casts a chart for the moment a question is asked. Its rules come from medieval and 17th-century astrologers such as William Lilly.

Electional

Electional astrology is the Western muhurta: choosing a date and time to begin something. Its usual guidelines:

• A strong, well-placed ruler of the matter (Venus for a wedding, Mercury for a contract).
• Benefics on the angles (1st, 4th, 7th, 10th houses) and malefics away from them.
• A waxing Moon that is not void of course and is applying to a benefic.
• Avoiding retrograde rulers (for example signing contracts during Mercury retrograde) and hard aspects to the key planets.

Mundane astrology, eclipses and markets

Can astrology describe countries and the world?

Mundane astrology (Medini Jyotish in India) studies nations, governments, the economy, weather and collective events instead of people. Varahamihira's Brihat Samhita (6th century) covers omens, rainfall, agriculture and the fortunes of kingdoms.

Its charts

Eclipses

• A solar eclipse happens at a new moon and a lunar eclipse at a full moon, but only when the Sun is near Rahu or Ketu. That is why eclipses come in "seasons" about every six months.
• The Saros cycle repeats a very similar eclipse every 18 years, 11 days and 8 hours. Eclipses linked by it form eclipse families.
• In a birth chart, an eclipse falling within a few degrees of a planet or angle is said to activate it and the house it is in for months afterwards.
• The eclipse path (where it is visible) matters most in mundane astrology.

Financial and market astrology

Some astrologers cast charts for companies, stock exchanges, IPOs and indices, and compare price history with planetary cycles (Jupiter–Saturn, Mars cycles, eclipses). Figures such as W. D. Gann popularised it.

Astrocartography and other branches

Does a chart change if I move to another city?

Astrocartography

Developed by Jim Lewis in the 1970s, astrocartography draws your birth chart onto a world map. For each planet it draws four lines: where that planet was rising, setting, overhead (MC) or underfoot (IC) at the moment you were born. Living near a planet's line is said to bring its themes forward: near a Venus line, love and comfort; near a Saturn line, hard work and responsibility; near a Jupiter line, growth and luck.

Other branches of astrology

How it all fits together

What is the order of reading a chart?

An astrologer reads in layers, from the simple building blocks up to the timing. Every statement in a good reading can be traced back down this list to the exact placements behind it.

Put together, a chart is a very large combination: 9 planets × 12 signs × 12 houses × 27 nakshatras × 4 padas, then aspects, lords, yogas, divisional charts, dashas and transits on top. That is why AstroMatch4u shows the placements behind every reading, so you can follow each statement back to where it came from.

Synthesis: one question, every layer

The real skill is not knowing what Venus in the 7th means, but joining every layer into one judgment. For a question about marriage, an astrologer walks this chain and only trusts a result that several links agree on:

The same chain works for any subject: swap the 7th for the 10th and D9 for D10 to read a career.

How AstroMatch4u turns a chart into scores

What is happening behind each number on my dashboard?

AstroMatch4u treats astrology as a knowledge system: the rules in the classical texts are written down as explicit, checkable rules, and a computer applies them the same way every time. Nothing is guessed.

The steps in plain words

• Data: your birth place is looked up for its latitude and longitude, and your birth time is converted to UTC with the international time-zone database.
• Features: every planet's sign, house, degree, nakshatra, pada, dignity, strength, aspects and conjunctions, plus yogas, dasha and transits, are worked out from the chart.
• Rules: each of the 75 readings is its own rule table. A rule looks like "if the 10th lord is in the 11th house and strong, add to career drive", with a weight. Rules that cancel or pull in opposite directions simply add and subtract, so a strength in one place can offset a weakness in another.
• Scores: the weighted evidence is added into a score from 0 to 10, and each score comes with a plain-words explanation of what in your chart drove it, so you can check it against this page.
• Explanations: the written explanations, and the optional AI report, turn those same factors into plain language. The AI is given the computed facts; it does not invent the chart.

Using astrology well

How do I get something good out of a reading without being misled?

A chart is best used as a mirror for reflection, not a verdict. A few habits make the difference between a helpful reading and a harmful one.

For anyone getting a reading

• Ask clear questions. "What should I focus on in my career this year?" gets a better answer than "will my life be good?".
• Look for agreement. A good reading shows several factors pointing the same way, and can tell you which placements it is based on.
• Expect uncertainty. Honest astrologers speak in tendencies ("a good time to…"), never in certainties ("you will…").
• Never hand over a big decision. Health, legal and financial decisions belong with doctors, lawyers and advisers.
• Walk away from fear. Anyone who predicts death, disaster or a curse, or insists on expensive remedies, is not practising astrology responsibly.

For anyone giving a reading

• Frame the question with the person, synthesise the whole chart, and say what you are unsure of.
• Handle sensitive subjects (health, children, divorce, death) with great care, or not at all.
• Avoid deterministic statements; leave room for choice and effort.
• Keep notes and real case studies, and test your methods honestly against what happens.
• Respect privacy: a birth chart is personal data.