Choghadiya: Meaning, 7 Types and the Day and Night Tables

Choghadiya is a simple way to choose a good time: the day, from sunrise to sunset, and the night, from sunset to the next sunrise, are each split into eight slots, and every slot carries one of seven names. Amrit, Shubh and Labh are favourable, Char is neutral and good for travel, and Udveg, Kaal and Rog are best avoided for new beginnings.

What choghadiya means and where it comes from

The word joins chau (four) and ghadiya, from ghati, a traditional unit of 24 minutes. A choghadiya is roughly four ghatis long, about an hour and a half, although its true length is always one-eighth of the actual day or night.

Choghadiya grew popular in Gujarat and Rajasthan, where traders and travellers needed a quick way to pick a good hour without consulting a priest for a full muhurat. It remains the favourite in those communities. Today it appears in almanacs across North and West India, and on the phones of families everywhere.

Diwali shows how traditions differ. Gujarati families perform Chopda Pujan, the worship of new account books, in a Labh, Amrit or Shubh choghadiya. Many North Indian families instead time Lakshmi Puja by Pradosh Kaal, the period after sunset, and a fixed rising sign. Both are long-standing practices, and neither is wrong.

The seven choghadiyas

Each choghadiya is ruled by one of the seven visible planets of the navagraha, and takes its quality from that planet.

The logic is planetary. The Moon’s nectar, Jupiter’s blessing and Mercury’s commerce are gentle and helpful; Venus’s Char suits movement and travel; while the Sun’s heat, Saturn’s delays and the aggression of Mars are thought to unsettle a new beginning.

Some regional guides find a use even for the difficult three (Udveg for dealings with government, which is the Sun’s domain, and Rog for facing a dispute), but most families simply avoid them for anything new.

How the sequence is built

The seven names follow the order of the planetary hours: Sun, Venus, Mercury, Moon, Saturn, Jupiter, Mars. The first day choghadiya belongs to the weekday’s own planet (Udveg for the Sun on Sunday, Amrit for the Moon on Monday), and the rest follow in that order. There are eight slots and only seven names, so the eighth slot repeats the first.

The night begins with the planet of the weekday four days ahead, so Thursday’s Shubh opens Sunday night, and then steps backwards through the same order two places at a time. You do not need to work this out; the tables below do it for you.

Day choghadiya (sunrise to sunset)

Night choghadiya (sunset to the next sunrise)

“Night of Sunday” means the night that follows Sunday’s sunset and runs until Monday’s sunrise.

How long each choghadiya lasts

Only when day and night are equal is every choghadiya 90 minutes long. Each day slot is one-eighth of the time from sunrise to sunset, and each night slot one-eighth of the time from sunset to the next sunrise, so the two change in opposite directions through the year.

In North India in midwinter, a day choghadiya shrinks to about an hour and a quarter, while a night choghadiya stretches to about an hour and three-quarters. In midsummer the pattern reverses. Abroad, especially at higher latitudes, the swing is wider still.

A useful link: a day choghadiya is always exactly as long as Rahu Kaal, because both are one-eighth of the daylight. And because both systems start counting at sunrise, their slots line up perfectly.

This is why a printed choghadiya chart with fixed clock times is only a rough guide. The slots have to be calculated from local sunrise and sunset each day.

Using choghadiya well

Four steps keep it simple.

1. Match the slot to the task. Char for a journey, Labh for business or the first day of a course, Shubh for a ceremony or blessing, and Amrit for anything important.
2. Check Rahu Kaal. Many families treat Rahu Kaal as the stronger “no”. On five days of the week it coincides with an unfavourable slot anyway: Udveg on Sunday, Kaal on Monday and Friday, Rog on Wednesday and Saturday. On the other two it does not: on Tuesday it falls exactly on the seventh day slot, a Shubh, and on Thursday exactly on the sixth, an Amrit. On those days, choose another good slot.
3. Mind the boundary at sunrise. Before sunrise you are still in the previous night’s sequence, so read the night table for yesterday.
4. Leave a small margin. The beginning is what counts, so start a few minutes inside the slot rather than at its very edge; almanacs and clocks can differ by a minute or two.

A quick example: on a Monday, the day opens with Amrit, a fine start for an early journey or a puja. The second slot is Kaal, which is also Monday’s Rahu Kaal, so anything new is better left until the Shubh that follows it.

For a big life event, use a full muhurat first, and choghadiya only to fine-tune the hour within it.

Which choghadiya for which task

These are the traditional matches. Where more than one slot suits a task, the first listed is the classic choice.

The table works with both the day and the night sequence. A night journey, for instance, can begin in a night Char just as well as a daytime one.

Choghadiya, hora and Rahu Kaal compared

Hora and choghadiya follow the same planetary order, so they often agree: the first hora of the day and the first day choghadiya both belong to the weekday’s planet. Where they disagree, hora is the finer tool for a planet-specific task, and choghadiya the broader one for a general start.

See today’s choghadiya for your city in our free Panchang. It lists the day and night slots in your local time, highlights the one running now, and shows Rahu Kaal on the same page, so overlaps are easy to spot.