Panchang

Today’s tithi, nakshatra, yoga, karana and the auspicious/inauspicious muhurat — plus the full vrat calendar and panchang tools. Everything is computed from our Swiss-Ephemeris panchang engine, not copied.

What is Panchang?

The Panchang (literally "five limbs") is the traditional Hindu almanac used to gauge the quality of a day. Its five parts — tithi, vara, nakshatra, yoga and karana — are computed from the exact positions of the Sun and Moon, so the panchang changes every day and shifts slightly by city. People use it to know the day’s tithi, choose an auspicious muhurat for important work, and identify vrat and festival days.

The five limbs of the Panchang

• Tithi — the lunar day — the angle between the Sun and Moon, 30 in a lunar month across the Shukla (waxing) and Krishna (waning) paksha.
• Vara — the weekday, each ruled by a graha (e.g. Sunday–Sun, Monday–Moon), which shapes the day’s character.
• Nakshatra — the lunar mansion the Moon occupies — 27 in all, each with its own nature and ruling planet.
• Yoga — a luni-solar combination (27 yogas) derived from the sum of the Sun and Moon’s longitudes; some are auspicious, some not.
• Karana — half of a tithi (11 karanas) — a finer unit used to fix the quality of a specific window.

Auspicious and inauspicious periods

Beyond the five limbs, the panchang marks specific windows each day. The auspicious ones include Brahma Muhurta (roughly 96–48 minutes before sunrise, ideal for prayer, meditation and study), the Abhijit Muhurta around solar noon (a fallback muhurat when no other is available), and Amrit Kaal (a nectar-like window for new work). The periods to avoid for starting anything important are Rahu Kaal (a ~90-minute window that shifts daily by weekday), Yamaganda and Gulika Kaal, plus Varjyam and Dur Muhurtam. Gandamool and Bhadra (Vishti Karana) are additional cautions some traditions observe. Every one of these is derived from sunrise, sunset and the tithi, so all of them move from day to day and differ slightly from one city to another.

How the Panchang is used each day

• Knowing the tithi & vara — to identify vrat, festival and shraddha days.
• Choosing a muhurat — an auspicious time for weddings, griha pravesh, naming, travel or a new venture.
• Daily worship (Sandhya) — timing the morning, midday and evening Sandhya and Surya Arghya at sunrise.
• Avoiding Rahu Kaal — so important work does not begin in an inauspicious window.
• Fasting & Sankalpa — a Sankalpa (vow) recites the day’s full panchang — tithi, vara, nakshatra, yoga, karana.

Special yogas in the Panchang

On top of the five limbs, certain combinations of weekday, tithi and nakshatra create special yogas that make a day unusually auspicious — or best avoided. The ones worth knowing:

• Sarvartha Siddhi Yoga — a weekday–nakshatra pairing that favours success in all undertakings.
• Amrit Siddhi Yoga — a nectar-like combination excellent for new beginnings (barring a few activity exceptions).
• Ravi Pushya & Guru Pushya — Pushya nakshatra on a Sunday or Thursday — highly favoured for purchases and investments.
• Dwipushkar & Tripushkar — yogas said to double or triple the result of what is begun — good for assets, cautionary for losses.
• Bhadra (Vishti Karana) — an inauspicious window when marriage, mundan, housewarming and travel are traditionally avoided.

Regional panchang traditions

The five limbs are universal, but India reads them through several regional calendars. North India follows the Purnimanta month (ending on the full moon) with Vikram Samvat; the west and south follow the Amanta month (ending on the new moon). The Tamil calendar is solar — months change at sankranti — and its daily practice adds Nalla Neram (good time) and Gowri Panchangam windows, which our Gowri tool computes. The Bengali Panjika and the Malayalam calendar (Kollavarsham) are likewise solar-anchored, while the Telugu and Kannada new year, Ugadi, opens the Chaitra lunar year. The tithis themselves are identical everywhere — only the month labels, new-year day and a few observance conventions differ, which is why the same festival can carry different month names in different regions.