Learn the Hindu calendar

Panchang is the Hindu almanac describing each day through five limbs — Tithi, Nakshatra, Yoga, Karana and Vaara — computed from the Sun and Moon.

A tithi is a lunar day — the time the Moon takes to move 12° ahead of the Sun. 30 tithis make a lunar month, split into Shukla and Krishna paksha.

A nakshatra is one of 27 lunar mansions — 13°20′ segments of the zodiac. The nakshatra of the day is the one the Moon occupies, used for naming and muhurta.

Rahu Kaal is a roughly 90-minute inauspicious period each day, one-eighth of the daytime, whose slot depends on the weekday. New ventures are avoided during it.

Choghadiya divides day and night into eight parts each (~90 minutes), labelled auspicious (Amrit, Shubh, Labh) or inauspicious (Rog, Kaal, Udveg) by their ruling planet.

A muhurat is an auspicious time window chosen for an activity by combining the panchang limbs — tithi, nakshatra, vaara, yoga and karana — into favourable yogas.

A kundali is a diagram of the sky at a birth moment — the lagna, twelve bhavas and nine grahas placed in the sidereal rashis. It records positions, not predictions.

The lagna is the rashi rising on the eastern horizon at a given moment. It changes about every two hours and fixes the twelve houses of a kundali.

A rashi is one of twelve 30° divisions of the sidereal zodiac. In Indian astrology “your rashi” usually means the Moon’s rashi at birth, not the Sun’s.

The navagraha are the nine grahas of Indian astronomy — Surya, Chandra, Mangala, Budha, Guru, Shukra, Shani and the two lunar nodes Rahu and Ketu.

A nakshatra is one of 27 lunar mansions — 13°20′ segments of the zodiac. The nakshatra of the day is the one the Moon occupies, used for naming and muhurta.

Vimshottari Dasha is a 120-year cycle of nine planetary periods. Which one runs at birth, and how much of it remains, is fixed by the Moon's nakshatra.

The naam akshar is the syllable a traditional name begins with, fixed by the pada of the nakshatra the Moon occupied at birth. There are 108 of them.

Mangal Dosha, or being manglik, is Mars falling in certain houses of a kundali. Which houses count — and from what reference point — varies by tradition.

Kundali Milan scores compatibility out of 36 gunas across eight kootas, computed almost entirely from the two Moon positions — nakshatra and rashi.

Ayanamsa is the angle between the sidereal and tropical zodiacs, growing about 50 arcseconds a year from precession. Lahiri is the standard Indian value.