Tithi · lunar day
Ashtami
Shukla paksha (the waxing fortnight)
The Panchang is the Vedic almanac of the day. Its name means “five limbs,” because it records five qualities of the day drawn from the positions of the Sun and the Moon: the tithi, the vara, the nakshatra, the yoga and the karana. Read together they tell you the lunar date, the weekday and its planetary ruler, the lunar mansion the Moon is travelling through, and the broad quality of the day.
A tithi is the time the Moon takes to gain 12 degrees of angular distance on the Sun. There are thirty tithis in a lunar month, fifteen in the bright (Shukla) fortnight as the Moon waxes to full, and fifteen in the dark (Krishna) fortnight as it wanes to new. Today's tithi is Ashtami of the Shukla paksha.
Each weekday is governed by a planet: Sunday by the Sun, Monday by the Moon, Tuesday by Mars, Wednesday by Mercury, Thursday by Jupiter, Friday by Venus and Saturday by Saturn. Today is Wednesday, ruled by Mercury.
The ecliptic is divided into 27 nakshatras of 13 degrees 20 minutes each. The nakshatra is the mansion the Moon occupies, and it changes roughly every thirteen hours. The Moon is now in Swati (pada 1), whose ruling planet is Rahu and whose presiding deity is Vayu.
The yoga is derived from the combined longitudes of the Sun and Moon and cycles through 27 named values; today it is Sadhya. A karana is half of a tithi, so there are two karanas in each lunar day; the active karana now is Bava.
Panchang is the Hindu Vedic almanac for a given day. The name means 'five limbs', because it records five elements of the day: the tithi (lunar day), the vara (weekday), the nakshatra (lunar mansion), the yoga, and the karana. Together they describe the position of the Sun and Moon and the quality of the day.
The five limbs are tithi (the lunar day, set by the angle between the Moon and the Sun), vara (the weekday and its planetary ruler), nakshatra (the lunar mansion the Moon occupies, one of 27), yoga (a value derived from the combined longitudes of the Sun and Moon), and karana (half of a tithi).
Today (22 July 2026 IST) the tithi is Ashtami of the Shukla (waxing) paksha, and the Moon is in the nakshatra Swati, pada 1, ruled by Rahu. These values are computed on the Swiss Ephemeris with the Lahiri ayanamsa and shift through the day.
BhagyaX computes the sidereal positions of the Sun and Moon on the Swiss Ephemeris using the Lahiri ayanamsa, the standard adopted in India. The tithi, nakshatra, yoga and karana are derived directly from those positions, so the reading reflects the current moment rather than a fixed daily table.
A day is generally treated as less favourable when it falls on a rikta tithi (Chaturthi, Navami or Chaturdashi) or under one of the inauspicious yogas. For an individual muhurat you also need your own birth chart, since the most favourable timing depends on your running dasha and Moon placement.