Nakshatras explained

The sky divided into 27

A rashi divides the zodiac into 12 signs of 30°. A nakshatra divides the same circle into 27 parts of 13°20′ each (360 ÷ 27). The word means "star" and each division is named after a star or small group of stars that once marked it: Ashwini begins at 0° Mesha (sidereal Aries), Bharani at 13°20′, Krittika at 26°40′, and so on round the sky to Revati, which ends at 360°. Nine nakshatras fit in every four signs, so every sign contains two and a quarter nakshatras, and nakshatra boundaries do not line up with sign boundaries. Krittika, for example, starts in Mesha and ends in Vrishabha.

The system is sidereal: degrees are measured from a fixed starting point among the stars, not from the spring equinox, so an ayanamsa (Lahiri in most Indian almanacs) is subtracted from tropical positions before a nakshatra is found. Two almanacs using different ayanamsas can place the Moon in different nakshatras near a boundary, which is why the ayanamsa is always stated.

Why the Moon

Every planet occupies some nakshatra at every moment, but the Moon's is the one that matters most. The Moon moves about 13° a day, so it crosses roughly one nakshatra per day and visits all 27 in a sidereal month of 27.3 days. In Jyotish the Moon stands for the mind, feelings and instincts; the nakshatra it occupied at your birth is called your janma nakshatra (birth star) and is treated as a finer, more personal signature than the Moon sign alone. When someone asks "what is my nakshatra", they mean this.

Padas: the four quarters

Each nakshatra is split into four padas of 3°20′. The padas matter for two reasons. First, 3°20′ is exactly one navamsa (a ninth of a sign), so each pada maps to one sign of the D9 chart; this is how the navamsa chart is built, and why the pada of your Moon changes its reading. Second, naming traditions assign a syllable to each pada, which is where the custom of choosing a child's first letter from the birth nakshatra comes from. The 108 padas (27 × 4) are also the number of beads on a mala.

The lords and your first dasha

Each nakshatra has a ruling planet, and the nine lords repeat in a fixed order three times around the zodiac: Ketu, Venus, Sun, Moon, Mars, Rahu, Jupiter, Saturn, Mercury. The lord of your janma nakshatra decides where the Vimshottari dasha begins. Vimshottari is a 120-year cycle of planetary periods (Ketu 7, Venus 20, Sun 6, Moon 10, Mars 7, Rahu 18, Jupiter 16, Saturn 19, Mercury 17 years). You are born part-way through the mahadasha of your nakshatra lord: how far the Moon had travelled through the nakshatra at birth sets how much of that first period is already spent. This single rule is why the birth time and the ayanamsa both matter so much; a few minutes can move the Moon across a boundary and change the whole dasha timeline.

Nakshatras in the panchang

The panchang has five limbs: tithi, vara, nakshatra, yoga and karana. The nakshatra of the day is the one the Moon occupies at local sunrise, and the almanac also prints the time the Moon leaves it. Because the Moon's speed varies, a nakshatra can last anywhere from about 22 to 26 hours, and on some days the Moon leaves one nakshatra before sunset and the day is labelled with two. Festivals such as Onam (Shravana in Simha month) and Masik Karthigai (Krittika each month) are fixed by the nakshatra, not the tithi.

Nakshatras in muhurat

Electional astrology classifies the 27 by quality. The classical groups are: fixed (dhruva: Rohini, Uttara Phalguni, Uttara Ashadha, Uttara Bhadrapada) for lasting works like foundations and marriage; movable (chara: Punarvasu, Swati, Shravana, Dhanishta, Shatabhisha) for travel and vehicles; soft (mridu: Mrigashira, Chitra, Anuradha, Revati) for arts, clothes and friendship; light (laghu: Ashwini, Pushya, Hasta, Abhijit) for trade, medicine and learning; sharp (tikshna: Ardra, Ashlesha, Jyeshtha, Mula) for decisive or destructive acts; fierce (ugra: Bharani, Magha, Purva Phalguni, Purva Ashadha, Purva Bhadrapada) for confrontation; and mixed (mishra: Krittika, Vishakha). Pushya is held auspicious for almost everything except marriage. The tara bala count, from your janma nakshatra to the day's nakshatra, is a second layer used for personal timing.

Nakshatras in kundli matching

Ashtakoota matching scores two charts out of 36 points, and most of those points come from the two Moon nakshatras. Nadi (8 points) compares the nadi of each nakshatra (Adi, Madhya, Antya); the same nadi is the classic Nadi dosha. Gana (6 points) compares deva, manushya and rakshasa temperaments. Yoni (4 points) compares the animal symbols. Tara (3 points) counts from one nakshatra to the other. Together with Bhakoot and Graha Maitri from the Moon signs, 21 of the 36 points depend directly on the nakshatras.

Abhijit, the 28th

Older texts list a 28th nakshatra, Abhijit, carved out of the last quarter of Uttara Ashadha and the first 4° of Shravana. It is not used in the 27-fold cycle of dashas or matching, but it survives as the Abhijit muhurat: the eighth of the fifteen daytime muhurtas, centred on local noon, treated as auspicious on every day except Wednesday.

How to find your nakshatra

You need the date, time and place of birth. Compute the Moon's sidereal longitude for that moment, divide by 13°20′ and round down: 0 is Ashwini, 26 is Revati. The remainder divided by 3°20′ gives the pada. LifeAstroAPI does this in one call (/v1/chart/planets returns nakshatra_idx andpada for every planet), and the free city panchang pages show today's nakshatra for any place. The 27 pages below carry the authored reading for each birth star and each of its padas.