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Vedic astrology

Which period of your life you are in

Vedic astrology, or Jyotish, is the Indian tradition. It uses a sidereal zodiac: the same twelve 30° signs, measured from a fixed stellar zero rather than the equinox. It weights the Moon and the Ascendant, and it times a life through dashas, planetary periods started from the Moon's nakshatra.

Jyotish divides a life into planetary periods, dashas, that run for years at a stretch. The Moon’s sidereal nakshatra determines which mahadasha you begin in; how far the Moon had travelled through that nakshatra determines how much of the first period remained at birth. This page shows the period you are in, when it turns, and the chart underneath it. The dates are calculated. What the periods mean is tradition.

AsterNym Jyotish method· Sidereal zodiac· Lahiri (Chitrapaksha) ayanamsa· Whole Sign houses· mean Rahu/Ketu· D1 + D9 only· 27 nakshatras · 108 padas· Vimshottari dasha· 365.25-day dasha year· method jyotish 1.0.0-alpha · config 1.0.0See full calculation method →

How this differs from your Western chart

Both are computed from the same sky. Jyotish uses a sidereal zodiac: the same twelve equal 30° signs, but referenced to a fixed stellar zero rather than the equinox the tropical zodiac uses. The two zeros are about 24° apart today and drift about one degree every 72 years. Most placements shift into the previous sign, though a placement in the last few degrees of a tropical sign stays in the same sign sidereally.

Jyotish gives the Moon and the Ascendant much more structural weight than beginner Western Sun-sign astrology does. The Moon anchors the nakshatra and the Vimshottari clock; the Lagna anchors the houses. The Sun is read too, as one graha among nine.

Compared with modern Sun-sign astrology, Jyotish gives unusually strong emphasis to timing through dashas: a fixed 120-year sequence of planetary periods, started from the Moon's nakshatra, that Western astrology has no direct equivalent for. It also carries a full natal reading of temperament, family, work and the rest; timing is the part this page leads with.

Vimshottari uses nine grahas: Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus and Saturn, plus the lunar nodes Rahu and Ketu. In Jyotish, graha is the traditional category; it does not mean all nine are physical planets. Rahu and Ketu are the points where the Moon's orbit crosses the ecliptic, always opposite each other, and AsterNym uses their mean positions.

The calculation method

Every convention below is locked in the engine and stamped onto each chart, so a saved chart reproduces under the rules that made it.

Zodiac
Sidereal. Tropical longitudes from astronomy-engine minus the Lahiri (Chitrapaksha) ayanamsa, computed from the Swiss Ephemeris anchor of 23°15′00.658″ at 21 March 1956 with IAU 2006 precession.
Grahas
Nine: Sun, Moon, Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus, Saturn, Rahu, Ketu. Outer planets are not used. Rahu is the mean node; Ketu is Rahu plus 180°.
Lagna
The sidereal ecliptic longitude rising at the birthplace at the birth instant. Birthplace is used for this and for the time zone only.
Houses
AsterNym uses Whole Sign houses for its Vedic D1 chart: the entire rising sign is House 1, the next sign House 2, and so on. Other Jyotish schools add bhava-chalit or other house calculations; this page does not.
Nakshatra and pada
27 nakshatras of 13°20′ from sidereal 0° Aries; four padas of 3°20′ each, 108 in all. Shown for every graha and the Lagna.
Divisional charts
D1 (Rashi) is the main natal chart. D9 (Navamsa) divides each sign into nine parts of 3°20′ and is used across Jyotish to assess a graha's strength and, among other things, relationship and dharma themes. It is not only a marriage chart. Because a navamsa is so narrow, the D9 Ascendant can change within minutes, so it is withheld when the birth time does not support it.
Dignity
Exaltation, debilitation, own sign and moolatrikona from the classical tables. No Shadbala, no Ashtakavarga, no yogas in this version. Exaltation, debilitation, own sign and moolatrikona are read from the classical tables as commonly published. Those tables have not yet been checked line by line by a Jyotish reviewer, so treat the dignity column as a convenience rather than a verdict.
Drishti
Graha drishti is the house-count rule, not a degree-based aspect: every graha looks at the 7th house from itself, Mars also at the 4th and 8th, Jupiter at the 5th and 9th, Saturn at the 3rd and 10th. It is not symmetric, so a graha can be looked at without looking back. Rashi drishti, the Jaimini sign aspect, is not computed here.
Verification
The ayanamsa anchor is the Swiss Ephemeris Lahiri definition, and the Sun and mean node at J2000 match published values. A chart-by-chart comparison against an external Jyotish application is still to be recorded, so until then treat placements within a few arcminutes of a boundary as needing a second opinion.

The twenty-seven nakshatras

Each spans 13°20′ of the sidereal zodiac, starting at 0° Aries, and each divides into four padas of 3°20′. Your Moon’s nakshatra sets which mahadasha you were born into, and how far it had travelled sets how much of that period was already spent.

Vimshottari, step by step

  1. 1. Moon's sidereal longitude. The Moon's tropical ecliptic longitude at the birth instant (astronomy-engine, VSOP87) minus the Lahiri ayanamsa for that instant.
  2. 2. Nakshatra index. Longitude divided by 13°20′ (48,000 arcseconds, held as an exact integer). 0 to 26, counted from Ashwini at sidereal 0° Aries.
  3. 3. Nakshatra lord. The nine-lord cycle Ketu, Venus, Sun, Moon, Mars, Rahu, Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury, repeated three times across the 27. The lord is the opening mahadasha.
  4. 4. Fraction elapsed. How far the Moon had travelled through that nakshatra, 0 to 1. This much of the opening mahadasha had already run at birth.
  5. 5. Opening balance. Mahadasha length × (1 − fraction elapsed). The mahadasha is anchored at birth minus the elapsed part; every later boundary is integer addition from that anchor.
  6. 6. Fixed sequence. The remaining lords follow in the fixed order for a 120-year cycle. Antardashas divide each mahadasha in the same order and proportions, starting from the mahadasha's own lord.
  7. 7. Dasha year. 1 dasha year = 31,557,600 seconds (365.25 days). Intervals are half-open: a period ends at the instant the next begins.

The fixed sequence: Ketu 7 → Venus 20 → Sun 6 → Moon 10 → Mars 7 → Rahu 18 → Jupiter 16 → Saturn 19 → Mercury 17 = 120 years.

The period dates are calculated under the conventions above and reproduce exactly from the same input. What Jyotish says those periods mean is tradition, and AsterNym labels it that way. A period is never a forecast of an event.

What your birth time supports

The words

Lagna
Ascendant
Chandra Rashi
Moon sign
Janma Nakshatra
Lunar mansion
Mahadasha
Major planetary period
Antardasha
Sub-period
Navamsa (D9)
Ninth divisional chart
Rashi (D1)
Main natal chart