Raj yoga check: kendra and trikona lords in your chart

Last updated 25 October 2026

Enter when and where you were born to find out which of the classical raja yoga rules your chart satisfies, one rule at a time, each with its verse. Below the calculator: how the conditions are counted, why a yoga alone settles nothing, and what to ask an astrologer about it.

How the combinations are counted

From when and where you were born, the calculator casts a chart: the rising sign (Lagna) and where each of the nine grahas stood in the sidereal zodiac, with the Lahiri ayanamsa. Each whole sign is one house, counted from the Lagna. Every sign has a single ruler, so Vrishchik is given to Mars and Kumbh to Saturn. Aspects are whole-sign too: every planet casts a full glance on the sign opposite, while Mars adds the signs four and eight away, Jupiter five and nine, and Saturn three and ten. The nodes rule no sign and cast no aspect here.

Six groups of conditions are then tested, each labelled with the verse it rests on:

• Kendra and trikona lords, from chapter 34 of the Brihat Parashara Hora Shastra: for each of the 11 pairings of an angle with a trine, whether the two rulers swap signs, share a sign or aspect each other. When only one of the two sits in its partner's house, that is listed apart as an interpretation of the verse. If either ruler also owns a dusthana (the 6th, 8th or 12th house), the result notes that the text withholds the yoga.
• The two trine rulers proper, of the 5th and the 9th, joined by sign or by mutual aspect.
• Yogakaraka: one planet owning both an angle other than the Lagna and the 5th or 9th.
• The nodes: a node placed in an angle or trine, joined or aspected by a ruler of the other kind.
• Harsha, Sarala and Vimala, from Phaladeepika: a dusthana ruler placed in a dusthana.
• Neecha Bhanga, also from Phaladeepika: for any debilitated planet, each listed condition under which that weakness is cancelled.

Alongside these you get the chart itself, a table of house rulers and the positions used, plus a warning when the Lagna was within fifteen minutes of changing sign, when a planet sat at the very edge of a sign, or when using the true node instead of the mean node would change any condition.

Why a raj yoga on its own predicts nothing

With 11 kendra–trikona pairings, several ways for two lords to connect, and a yogakaraka for some rising signs, it is common for a chart to meet at least one of these conditions. If the combinations were decisive on their own, recognition would be ordinary. The classical texts avoid that conclusion by weighing every yoga: dignity, house placement, combustion or affliction, and how each planet fares in the navamsa. This calculator lists conditions; it does not grade them.

Timing is the other half. Astrologers traditionally expect a yoga to show its results during the periods (Vimshottari dashas and sub-periods) of the planets that form it. A strong combination whose planets' periods fall in childhood or very late in life is read quite differently from one whose period is about to begin. You can see your own sequence of periods with the Vimshottari dasha calculator.

Finally, the word “raj” is old language for standing and authority. In a modern reading it usually points to responsibility and recognition in your own field rather than wealth or fame, and it says nothing about effort, circumstances or choices. For career or money decisions, an astrologer's view is no substitute for a qualified adviser.

Questions to ask your astrologer about raj yogas

• Which of the conditions in my chart do you consider strong, and why?
• Does any planet in these combinations also own a dusthana, and how does that change the reading?
• When do the periods of the planets forming my strongest yoga run?
• How do these planets look in my navamsa and dasamsa charts?
• Is my birth time secure enough for a reading that depends on the Lagna?
• What does this mean in practical terms for the question I came with?

For help turning a list of yogas into useful questions, see what to expect in an astrology reading.

Lords of the 5th and 9th, and yogakarakas, by Lagna

The trine rulers and any yogakaraka depend only on the rising sign, so they can be set out in advance. A dash means that for this Lagna no one planet owns an angle and a trine together.