Yogas and Ashtakavarga Calculator

Yogas and Ashtakavarga answer different questions. Yogas describe promises built into the chart, while Ashtakavarga gives a numeric sense of which signs are supportive. A common way to read them together is to look at the signs involved in a yoga and check their points. A yoga formed in signs with high scores is often given more weight than one formed in signs with low scores. Ashtakavarga is also used in transit work: when Saturn or Jupiter moves through a sign with many points, the period is traditionally described as easier.

In Vedic astrology a yoga is a specific combination of planets, signs and houses that the classical texts describe and name. Examples include Gajakesari, formed by the Moon and Jupiter in angular positions from each other, and the Pancha Mahapurusha yogas, formed when Mars, Mercury, Jupiter, Venus or Saturn is strong in an angle.

The tool checks the chart against a set of these rules and lists the yogas it finds. A yoga being present is a starting point for a reading, not a conclusion, because the strength of the planets involved also matters.

Ashtakavarga gives each sign a score based on the positions of seven planets and the ascendant. Each contributor gives a point, called a bindu, to certain signs counted from its own position. Adding the points from all eight contributors gives the Sarvashtakavarga, a total for each sign.

The average is about 28 points per sign, and the total across all twelve signs is always 337. Signs with more points are traditionally considered more supportive, both for planets placed there at birth and for planets moving through them later in transit.

The chart uses the sidereal zodiac with the Lahiri ayanamsa, whole-sign houses and true nodes. The yoga rules and Ashtakavarga tables are provided by an established open-source astrology library. We plan to replace them with our own code one tool at a time.

Different books define some yogas differently, and some apply cancellation rules. The list here may therefore include or omit yogas that another source would treat differently. These results have not yet been checked against published reference charts.