"Panch-ang" means five limbs. Every Hindu almanac, from a printed Thakur Prasad calendar to an app, gives the same five values for each day. All of them come from just two things: where the Sun and the Moon are.
1. Tithi - the lunar day
The Moon gains about 12° on the Sun every day. Each 12° of separation is one tithi, so a lunar month has 30: 15 in Shukla paksha (waxing, Pratipada to Purnima) and 15 in Krishna paksha (waning, Pratipada to Amavasya). Tithis decide festivals and vrats - Ekadashi, Chaturthi, Purnima. See why vrat dates differ.
2. Vaar - the weekday
The Hindu day runs from sunrise to sunrise, not midnight to midnight. Each weekday has a ruling planet (Ravi, Soma, Mangal, Budh, Guru, Shukra, Shani), which drives Rahu kaal and choghadiya.
3. Nakshatra - the Moon's star
The zodiac is divided into 27 nakshatras of 13°20' each, from Ashwini to Revati. The nakshatra of the day is the one the Moon is in. The Moon's nakshatra at your birth is your janma nakshatra - the basis of kundli matching and of tara bala in muhurats.
4. Yoga - Sun plus Moon
Add the Sun's and Moon's positions and divide into 27 parts of 13°20': that's the yoga (Vishkambha, Priti, Ayushman ... Vaidhriti). Vyatipata and Vaidhriti are considered inauspicious; Siddhi, Shubha and Amrit-like yogas are good.
5. Karana - half a tithi
Each tithi has two karanas (6° each), 60 in a month: seven movable ones repeat eight times (Bava, Balava, Kaulava, Taitila, Gara, Vanija, Vishti), and four fixed ones come once (Shakuni, Chatushpada, Naga, Kimstughna). Vishti, better known as Bhadra, is avoided for auspicious work - Raksha Bandhan and Holika Dahan timings are famously set around Bhadra.
The sidereal zodiac and ayanamsa
Indian panchangs measure positions in the sidereal zodiac, tied to the stars, not the seasons. The gap between the sidereal and Western (tropical) zodiac is the ayanamsa - about 24°13' in 2026 by the Lahiri (Chitrapaksha) value, the Government of India's standard. That's why your Western "sun sign" is usually one sign ahead of your Vedic rashi.
Lunar months and samvat
The lunar month is named by the Sun's sign at the new moon (amanta, used in Gujarat, Maharashtra and the South) or runs full moon to full moon (purnimanta, North India), so the Krishna paksha of a month has different names in different regions. The Vikram Samvat year begins on Chaitra Shukla Pratipada - VS 2083 began in March 2026.
Our free panchang shows all five limbs for your city, with end times, in English or Hindi.