How to read a Kundli chart
A Kundli diagram places the grahas in signs and houses. Start with its caption: the Lagna chart is D1, while Navamsa is D9. A position in one division is not automatically the same house or sign in another.
North and South Indian layouts
The North Indian layout fixes the houses. The top central diamond is the first house; counting continues anticlockwise. Its large number identifies the sign, not the house number. If it shows 4, the first house contains Cancer.
The South Indian layout fixes the signs. Aries is the second cell along the top edge, followed clockwise by Taurus and the remaining signs. Pisces is the top-left cell. The ascendant label and diagonal corner mark locate the first house. Count clockwise from that sign.
Switching layout on panchang.now changes the arrangement of all chart panels, not their values. The selected style is remembered in that browser.
Chart symbols
| Mark | Meaning |
|---|---|
| R | Retrograde motion |
| D | Rahu or Ketu moving forward under the true-node choice |
| C | Combust, within the selected proximity limit to the Sun |
| E | An eclipse at the birth time; see the qualification below |
| ↑ / ↓ | Exalted or debilitated in the chart being read |
| V | Vargottama, the same sign in D1 and D9 |
Small numbers beside grahas show degrees. D1 uses the natal sign degree; D9 uses the degree within the Navamsa sign. Most smaller divisional panels omit degrees. None of these marks is a complete favourable or unfavourable verdict.
Eclipsed at birth
E marks the Sun during a solar eclipse or the Moon during a lunar eclipse, including a penumbral one. It identifies the eclipse at that moment, not whether it was visible from the birthplace. A node conjunction alone is not this eclipse test.
Abbreviations
Su is Sun, Mo Moon, Ma Mars, Me Mercury, Ju Jupiter, Ve Venus, Sa Saturn, Ra Rahu and Ke Ketu. Ur, Ne and Pl identify Uranus, Neptune and Pluto in the limited outer-planet display. As or Asc marks the ascendant.
| Number | Sign label | Compact longitude |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Ari, Aries | Ar |
| 2 | Tau, Taurus | Ta |
| 3 | Gem, Gemini | Ge |
| 4 | Can, Cancer | Cn |
| 5 | Leo | Le |
| 6 | Vir, Virgo | Vi |
| 7 | Lib, Libra | Li |
| 8 | Sco, Scorpio | Sc |
| 9 | Sag, Sagittarius | Sg |
| 10 | Cap, Capricorn | Cp |
| 11 | Aqu, Aquarius | Aq |
| 12 | Pis, Pisces | Pi |
BL, HL, GL and SL identify the special lagnas. The upagraha guide decodes their separate point abbreviations. The Positions table provides full names and precise longitudes when a diagram becomes crowded.
A worked chart in both layouts
This fictional example uses 7 February 2003, 13:10 IST (07:40 UTC), Delhi at 28.6139° N, 77.2090° E, True Chitrapaksha and mean nodes. The time is an invented teaching input, not a person's birth record.
Both drawings place the ascendant in Taurus, sign 2. The Sun (Su) is in Capricorn, the ninth whole-sign house from Taurus. The Moon (Mo) is in Aries, the twelfth. In the North Indian drawing the Sun therefore occupies the ninth-house compartment, labelled 10 for Capricorn. In the South Indian drawing it occupies Capricorn's fixed cell.
The Moon carries V because its D1 and D9 signs are both Aries. Jupiter carries R and ↑ because it is retrograde and exalted in Cancer. These marks describe separate conditions; they do not cancel one another.
The Sun moves to the tenth house in this example's Sripati chalit chart while remaining in Capricorn. That distinction is explained in rashi versus chalit.
See the chart and its tables on the Kundli page.