What is panchang?
Panchang (also spelled panchangam) literally means "five limbs" in Sanskrit — pancha (five) + anga (limb). It's the traditional Vedic calendar system, and the five limbs are five separate ways of describing where the Sun, Moon and the day itself sit on any given date: vara (weekday), tithi (lunar day), nakshatra (the Moon's star-sector), yoga (a Sun-Moon combination point), and karana (half a tithi). Together they're read before fixing dates for weddings, housewarmings, starting a business, or any event where timing is treated as meaningful.
Every value on this page is computed live from the same sidereal Lahiri-ayanamsha planetary positions that drive this site's live transit wheel — not pulled from a pre-printed almanac. This is today panchang, recalculated the moment you load the page rather than cached from this morning, and it works as a panchang daily check too — reload tomorrow and every value has moved on its own. tithi today and nakshatra today are the two most commonly checked values on their own, and both are broken out separately in the panel above alongside the full five-anga picture.
Vara — the weekday
The simplest of the five: which of the seven days of the week it is. In Vedic tradition each vara is ruled by a planet — Sunday by the Sun, Monday by the Moon, Tuesday by Mars, Wednesday by Mercury, Thursday by Jupiter, Friday by Venus, Saturday by Saturn — the same order English weekday names quietly preserve (Saturday/Saturn, Sunday/Sun, Monday/Moon).
Tithi — the lunar day
A tithi measures the angular distance between the Moon and the Sun, not the clock. Every time the Moon pulls 12 degrees further ahead of the Sun than it was, one tithi has passed. Because the Moon's own speed varies through its orbit, a tithi isn't a fixed 24 hours — it can run anywhere from about 20 to 26 hours, and can even start and end within the same solar day.
There are 30 tithis in a full lunar month, split into two 15-tithi halves called pakshas: Shukla Paksha (the waxing half, Moon growing fuller, ending in Purnima — full moon) and Krishna Paksha (the waning half, ending in Amavasya — new moon). Each tithi within a paksha has its own name — Pratipada, Dwitiya, Tritiya and on through Chaturdashi — before the cycle closes on Purnima or Amavasya.
Nakshatra — the Moon's star-sector
The zodiac's 360 degrees are divided into 27 nakshatras of 13°20′ each, and whichever one the Moon currently sits in is today's nakshatra. It's the same figure this site's dedicated Nakshatra Finder calculates for a person's own birth moment — here it's simply calculated for right now instead. The Moon moves through roughly one nakshatra a day, completing the full 27-nakshatra lap in about 27.3 days (a sidereal month).
Yoga — the Sun-Moon combination point
Yoga is the anga most people haven't heard of, and it's easy to confuse with the physical practice of the same name — this is unrelated. Panchang's yoga is computed from the combined longitude of the Sun and the Moon added together (rather than their difference, which gives the tithi), divided into 27 fixed segments with their own names — Vishkambha, Priti, Ayushman and so on through Vaidhriti. Each yoga is traditionally treated as carrying its own character, ranging from favourable to inauspicious, and forms one more input alongside tithi and nakshatra when checking whether a date is well-suited for a major event.
Karana — half a tithi
A karana is exactly half of a tithi, so a full lunar month holds 60 of them. Despite that, there are only 11 names in circulation: seven "movable" karanas — Bava, Balava, Kaulava, Taitila, Garija, Vanija and Vishti — repeat through a fixed cycle eight times over, covering 56 of the 60 slots. The remaining four are "fixed" karanas that occur exactly once each, anchoring the very start and end of the lunar month: Kimstughna opens the cycle, and Shakuni, Chatushpada and Naga close it out. Vishti (also known as Bhadra) is the one most commonly flagged in muhurta work — traditionally considered a poor window for starting something new.
Samvatsara, Rahu Kalam, Yamaganda, Durmuhurtam and Varjyam
The Samvatsara is the year's name, cycling through a fixed 60-year sequence and changing every Ugadi (Chaitra Shukla Padyami). Rahu Kalam and Yamaganda each split that weekday's daylight (sunrise to sunset) into eight equal parts and mark one specific part as inauspicious. Durmuhurtam similarly flags one or two short inauspicious windows during the day or night depending on the weekday. Varjyam works differently — it's based on ghatis counted from the start of that day's nakshatra, independent of the weekday. Starting new tasks, travel or important agreements during any of these four windows is traditionally avoided.
Two auspicious windows are also shown. Abhijit Muhurta is the 8th of 15 equal muhurtas dividing the daylight — centred on the Sun's midday position, and considered favourable for nearly any task. Brahma Muhurta starts 96 minutes before sunrise and ends 48 minutes before sunrise, traditionally held to be the best window for meditation, prayer and other spiritual practice.
If you allow it, your browser's own location is used to calculate these times — otherwise they default to Hyderabad's sunrise/sunset.
How this page is different from a printed panchang
Most panchang tables online are generated once and cached, sometimes for the whole day, sometimes longer. This page computes tithi, nakshatra, yoga and karana fresh from the Sun and Moon's actual sidereal longitude every time it loads — the same live ephemeris data that powers the transit wheel, not a lookup table. The date field above lets you check any other day, past or future, using the same live calculation rather than a separately maintained archive.
One honest limitation: traditional panchangs anchor a tithi's start/end to a specific city's sunrise, and this page doesn't — it reports the sidereal Sun-Moon angle directly. Near a changeover, your local panchang may show a different tithi for a few hours around sunrise than this page does; both are correct, they're just using different boundary conventions.
Frequently asked questions
What is today's panchang?
The panel above shows it live: today's vara (weekday), tithi (lunar day), nakshatra, yoga and karana, all computed from the Sun and Moon's real sidereal positions at the moment you load the page — not read from a static printed table. Use the date field to check any other day, past or future.
What are the five angas of panchang?
Panchang literally means "five limbs": vara (the weekday), tithi (the lunar day), nakshatra (which of the 27 star-sectors the Moon is in), yoga (a Sun-Moon combination point), and karana (half a tithi). Together the five give a complete Vedic-calendar snapshot of a given day, which is why panchang is checked before scheduling weddings, housewarmings and other important events.
What is a tithi?
A tithi is a lunar day — the time it takes the Moon to move 12 degrees further from the Sun than it was. There are 30 tithis in a lunar month, 15 in the waxing half (Shukla Paksha, ending in Purnima/full moon) and 15 in the waning half (Krishna Paksha, ending in Amavasya/new moon). Unlike a solar day, a tithi's length varies — anywhere from about 20 to 26 hours — because the Moon's speed around Earth isn't constant.
What is a yoga in panchang?
Yoga here doesn't mean the physical practice — it's the third anga of panchang, one of 27 fixed points based on the combined longitude of the Sun and Moon (unlike a tithi, which uses their difference). Each yoga is traditionally read as carrying its own character, some considered favourable and a few inauspicious, and is checked alongside tithi and nakshatra before fixing a date for an important event.
What is a karana?
A karana is exactly half a tithi, so there are 60 per lunar month. Only 11 names cover all 60: seven "movable" karanas (Bava, Balava, Kaulava, Taitila, Garija, Vanija, Vishti) repeat in a fixed cycle eight times over, and four "fixed" ones — Kimstughna, Shakuni, Chatushpada and Naga — occur exactly once each, anchoring the start and end of the lunar month. Vishti (also called Bhadra) is traditionally treated as inauspicious for starting new ventures.
Why does panchang matter for choosing a date?
Muhurta, the practice of picking an auspicious time for weddings, griha pravesh (housewarming), starting a business or other major events, is built directly on the five angas. A good muhurta generally avoids Vishti karana, certain inauspicious yogas, and tithis considered weak (like the 4th, 9th and 14th), while favouring specific nakshatras for specific purposes. This page shows the raw panchang; picking a muhurta from it is a separate, more specialised judgement usually made with a priest or astrologer.
Is this panchang the same across India?
The tithi, nakshatra, yoga and karana shown here are sidereal positions and don't change by location — they're the same for everyone on Earth at a given moment. What does vary regionally is sunrise time, which some traditional panchangs use as the boundary where one tithi hands off to the next; this page doesn't factor in a specific city's sunrise, so treat the exact hour of a changeover as approximate if your local panchang differs by a few hours.
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