Nakshatra Calculator, Your Birth Star

What a nakshatra is

The zodiac is a circle of 360 degrees. The twelve signs cut it into blocks of thirty. The twenty seven nakshatras cut the same circle into blocks of thirteen degrees and twenty minutes, and each of those is divided again into four padas of three degrees twenty.

Your nakshatra is whichever of those the Moon occupied at the moment you were born. Because the Moon moves about thirteen degrees a day, it crosses roughly one nakshatra per day, which makes this far more specific to you than a sun sign shared with a twelfth of the planet.

The system predates the twelve sign zodiac in Indian use. The nakshatras are named after the star groups that mark them, and much of classical Jyotish is built on them rather than on the signs.

Why the pada matters

Each nakshatra splits into four padas, and the pada places you inside a navamsa, the ninth division of the chart used to judge the strength of a placement and, traditionally, marriage.

It is also the practical reason people ask for their nakshatra at all. In many Indian families the first syllable of a child's name is chosen from the pada of their birth star, which is why the same nakshatra produces recognisable clusters of names.

Your nakshatra sets your dasha

Vimshottari dasha, the timing system that decides when things in a chart are supposed to happen, does not start from your sign. It starts from the exact position of the Moon inside your nakshatra.

Each nakshatra has a ruling planet, and that planet's period is the one you were born into. How far through the nakshatra the Moon had travelled decides how much of that first period was left. This is why two people born on the same day, hours apart, can be running completely different dashas for decades.

Nakshatras in matching

Ashtakoot gun milan, the 36 point marriage matching system, is built almost entirely from nakshatras. Tara, Yoni, Gana and Nadi all come from the birth star rather than the sign, which is four of the eight kootas and twenty one of the thirty six points.

Nadi in particular carries eight points on its own, and it is decided purely by which of three groups the two nakshatras fall into. If you have ever heard that a match failed on Nadi dosha, this is what was being checked.

Frequently asked questions