Major Arcana Cards: List and Meanings of All 22 Cards

The Major Arcana are the 22 named cards of the tarot, numbered 0 to 21 from The Fool to The World, and they stand for life’s big themes, lessons and turning points. When one appears in a reading, the question touches something larger than daily events; when several appear, the matter is usually an important chapter.

The 22 Major Arcana at a glance

This list follows the Rider–Waite–Smith deck, the source of most modern meanings and the deck our Tarot reader uses. The last column gives each card’s lean in a yes-or-no reading, upright first and reversed second.

Strength is card 8 and Justice card 11 in this deck. Older Marseille-style decks number them the other way round, so do not worry if your own deck differs.

Where the Major Arcana come from

Arcana means “secrets”. The 22 cards began as the trump cards of an Italian card game in the fifteenth century and were taken up for divination in eighteenth-century France. The Rider–Waite–Smith deck, designed by A. E. Waite, drawn by Pamela Colman Smith and published in London in 1909, gave them the images most people recognise today.

Readers often see the sequence as the Fool’s journey. The Fool carries the number 0: he is the traveller who has not yet begun, setting out with an open heart. A common teaching method lays the other 21 cards in three rows of seven, each row a stage of his journey, and the sections below follow that pattern.

Cards 1 to 7: learning to act in the world

The first row is about the outer world: skills, authority, teachers, relationships and willpower.

• The Magician (1) has every tool on his table. He asks you to combine your skills with clear intent and turn an idea into something real.
• The High Priestess (2) is quiet inner knowing. Not every answer needs chasing; some arrive when you make room for stillness.
• The Empress (3) is growth through care: comfort, creativity and patience. In love she speaks of affection; in work, of projects that thrive when tended.
• The Emperor (4) brings structure, clear rules and calm authority. Reversed, the same energy turns rigid or controlling.
• The Hierophant (5) is tradition and teaching: mentors, shared values and established paths. Reversed, it suggests a script that no longer fits you.
• The Lovers (6) is about connection, and about choices that reflect your true values, not only romance.
• The Chariot (7) is determination: pulling competing impulses in one direction and moving through obstacles.

Cards 8 to 14: the inner work

The second row turns inward, towards courage, solitude, fairness and change.

• Strength (8) is calm, kind courage rather than force. It meets a hard situation with patience and softens it through compassion.
• The Hermit (9) steps back from the noise to find his own light. Reversed, solitude has slipped into isolation or avoidance.
• Wheel of Fortune (10) is the turning of cycles. Circumstances shift, so stay flexible and use the timing well.
• Justice (11) asks for honesty: weigh the facts, own your part and act with integrity.
• The Hanged Man (12) is a purposeful pause. Looking at a problem from the opposite side often unlocks it.
• Death (13) is a chapter closing so that a new one can begin. It speaks of transformation, never of physical death.
• Temperance (14) blends opposites into a middle path, with patience and moderation.

Cards 15 to 21: shadow, light and completion

The last row moves through difficulty into clarity and wholeness.

• The Devil (15) shows what has you hooked: a habit, a dynamic or a belief. Naming it is the first step, and the chains are looser than they look.
• The Tower (16) is sudden change that brings down something built on shaky ground and clears the way for something sturdier.
• The Star (17) is hope returning after a hard stretch: quiet healing and renewed faith in your direction.
• The Moon (18) is uncertainty and imagination. Things are not yet clear, so move gently and avoid decisions made from fear.
• The Sun (19) is joy, warmth, success and honesty, the brightest card in the deck.
• Judgement (20) is an awakening: an honest look back, forgiveness, and the answer to a call you keep hearing.
• The World (21) is completion. A cycle closes well, and the next one is already in view.

Reading Major Arcana in a spread

A Major Arcana card points to something bigger than daily events: a lesson, a change of direction, or forces beyond your immediate control. A few practical rules help.

• Count them. One Major in a three-card spread adds weight. When more than half the spread is Major Arcana, the reading speaks of a significant chapter, and our reader says so in its summary.
• Mind the position. The Tower in the past is a shake-up already lived through; in the future, it is a change worth preparing for.
• Read them with the Minors. The Major names the theme, and the Minor Arcana around it show where that theme lives day to day. The Hermit beside the Eight of Pentacles is focused, solitary work; beside the Two of Cups, it may be time apart within a relationship.
• Read reversals as variations. A reversed card usually shows the same energy blocked, delayed, turned inward or out of balance, not its opposite.

The cards people fear

Death, The Tower and The Devil cause most of the worry, and none of them is a sentence. Death is transformation, not physical death. The Tower is a false structure falling so that the truth can come out. The Devil is an attachment you can step away from, which is why, reversed, it leans yes in a yes-or-no reading.

The Moon is uncertainty, not deception, and The Hanged Man is a pause, not a trap. Tarot works best as a mirror for reflection: no card fixes the future, and no card should be used to make medical, legal or financial decisions.

Major Arcana in yes-or-no readings

In our reader, 15 of the 22 Major Arcana lean yes when upright, 4 lean maybe (The High Priestess, The Hermit, The Hanged Man and The Moon) and 3 lean no (Death, The Devil and The Tower).

Reversed, most turn to no or maybe, because their promise is blocked or delayed for now. Three turn to yes: The Devil and The Moon, whose reversal eases a difficulty, and The Sun, which stays a yes, only slower. A single card gives a lean, not a guarantee; our guide to how yes-or-no tarot works covers the whole deck.

How to learn the Major Arcana

• Learn them in rows. Seven cards at a time, as above, is far easier than twenty-two at once.
• Describe the picture first. Say what you see in the image, in your own words, before you look up the meaning.
• Draw one card a day. Our free card of the day stays the same all day, so you can watch where its theme turns up.
• Notice the pairs. The Empress and The Emperor, The High Priestess and The Hierophant, and The Sun and The Moon each show two sides of one idea.
• Keep a journal. Note the question, the card and what happened next. Your own patterns teach more than any list.

When you are ready for the whole deck, our beginner’s guide to tarot card meanings covers the four suits, the numbers and the court cards. For a deep reading in which the Major Arcana often set the theme, learn the Celtic Cross spread, or draw your card of the day in our free Tarot reader.