Ashtakoot Matching Kootas: The Eight Scores

What the Number Actually Means

If someone has told you your ashtakoot score is too low to marry, that is not what the system says. The eight kootas produce a number out of 36, and that number measures specific qualities of Moon-nakshatra compatibility. It does not measure whether a marriage will be happy, whether two people are suited, or whether a relationship should happen at all.

Ashtakoot is the eight-fold scoring system used in North Indian kundli matching. It is calculated entirely from two pieces of data: the janma nakshatra (the nakshatra, one of the twenty-seven lunar mansions, in which the Moon sat at the moment of birth) and the Chandra rashi (the rashi, one of the twelve 30-degree divisions of the sky, that the Moon occupied at birth) for each person. The full birth chart, with its Lagna (the rising point), its planetary dignities, and its Dasha (the running planetary period), does not enter this calculation at all.

That scope is the most important thing to understand before reading any score.

The Eight Kootas and Their Points

The eight kootas carry fixed point values that sum to exactly 36. They are, in order: Varna (1 point), Vashya (2), Tara (3), Yoni (4), Graha Maitri (5), Gana (6), Bhakoot (7), and Nadi (8). Each koota either scores its full points, partial points, or zero, depending on the relationship between the two nakshatras and rashis.

The distribution is not arbitrary. The kootas weighted most heavily are the ones the tradition treats as most consequential. Nadi and Bhakoot together account for 15 of the 36 points, nearly half the total, and they are the two most often named when practitioners discuss serious concerns in a match.

What Each Koota Measures

Varna, carrying one point, measures spiritual disposition and is the lightest of the eight. It classifies nakshatras into broad temperamental groupings and asks whether the two dispositions are compatible in orientation.

Vashya, worth two points, concerns mutual influence: which partner naturally holds more sway in the dynamic between the two. It is not about dominance in a negative sense but about the natural flow of influence within the relationship.

Tara, worth three points, looks at the nakshatra-to-nakshatra relationship by counting the position of one person's janma nakshatra from the other's. Some counts are considered harmonious, others less so. The calculation is done in both directions, since the relationship looks different depending on which nakshatra you start from.

Yoni, carrying four points, is often described as physical and instinctive compatibility. Each nakshatra is assigned an animal symbol, and the pairing of two animals determines the Yoni score. Some pairings are considered friendly, some neutral, and some in direct opposition.

Graha Maitri, worth five points, shifts from nakshatra data to rashi data. It looks at the lords of the two Chandra rashis, meaning the grahas (the nine moving bodies of Jyotish) that govern each person's Moon rashi, and asks whether those two grahas are friends, neutrals, or enemies in the traditional planetary friendship scheme. A full explanation of how graha friendships are calculated is part of the library, where each component of the chart is covered in depth.

Gana, worth six points, groups nakshatras into three temperamental types: Deva (roughly aligned with refinement and harmony), Manushya (human in quality, practical and relational), and Rakshasa (independent, intense, and resistant to convention). Full Gana compatibility scores when both partners share the same Gana. Partial scores apply to some combinations. Zero applies to others, though practitioners differ on exactly which pairings are treated as incompatible.

Bhakoot and Nadi

Bhakoot, carrying seven points, is the rashi-to-rashi relationship. It counts the position of one person's Chandra rashi from the other's and assigns a score based on that interval. Certain intervals are considered inauspicious and produce what is called Bhakoot dosha. The most discussed are the 6/8 and 9/5 rashi relationships.

Bhakoot dosha has recognised cancellation conditions. If both partners share the same rashi lord, meaning their Chandra rashis are both governed by the same graha, the dosha is generally considered cancelled. Some practitioners also recognise cancellation when the Gana score is perfect. These are chart facts, not workarounds: the cancellation conditions are part of how the system is designed.

Nadi, carrying eight points, is the highest-weighted koota. It classifies each nakshatra into one of three constitutional types: Adi (sometimes called Vata), Madhya (sometimes called Pitta), and Antya (sometimes called Kapha). When both partners share the same Nadi, the result is called Nadi dosha, and the koota scores zero.

Nadi dosha also has cancellation conditions the tradition recognises. If the two partners share the same janma nakshatra but different rashis or different padas (the four quarters of a nakshatra), some practitioners treat the dosha as cancelled or significantly reduced. If the two partners share the same Chandra rashi but different nakshatras, similar reasoning applies. Practitioners differ on exactly how strictly these cancellations are applied, and no single rule governs all schools of practice. A fuller treatment of this dosha, including the cancellation conditions in detail, is on the Nadi Dosha page.

The weight given to Nadi in the scoring reflects a longstanding emphasis on constitutional compatibility in the tradition. Whether that emphasis is always decisive is a matter on which practitioners genuinely differ.

Reading the Total Honestly

Convention holds that a score above roughly 18 out of 36 is adequate for matching purposes. Below that threshold, the match is conventionally considered weak. This is practitioner convention rather than a fixed doctrinal line, and the threshold is not uniform across all schools.

What matters more than the raw total is which kootas are scoring and which are not. A score of 24 that includes zero on Nadi is a different situation from a score of 24 where Nadi is full and a lighter koota is missing. Reading the distribution tells you more than reading the sum.

The total also does not tell you why a score is what it is. Two matches might both score 20, but one might have Bhakoot dosha without cancellation and the other might simply have several neutral pairings in the lighter kootas. Those are meaningfully different, and collapsing them into the same number loses that distinction.

A practitioner who reads the kootas individually, notes which doshas are present, checks the cancellation conditions, and then looks at the full chart is doing something substantially more rigorous than reading a percentage. The number is a starting point, not a verdict.

What the 36 Points Leave Out

Ashtakoot is built on Moon-nakshatra data alone. That is both its precision and its limit.

It does not consider the 7th bhava (the area of the chart most directly associated with partnership and marriage) in either person's chart. It does not look at Venus, the graha most associated with relationship, love, and desire, in either placement or dignity. It does not examine the Dasha running in either chart, which determines what period of life each person is actually in and what themes are active. It does not assess Manglik status, which concerns the placement of Mangal (Mars) relative to certain bhavas and is evaluated separately in most full matching processes.

Two people with a low ashtakoot score may have strong 7th bhava indicators, compatible Venus placements, and running Dashas that support partnership. Two people with a high score may have significant tensions elsewhere in the chart that the kootas never see. This is why experienced practitioners treat ashtakoot as one layer of matching rather than the whole of it.

The guides section covers the broader landscape of chart compatibility, including the factors that sit outside this scoring system. For questions about how the calculation works or what practitioners do when scores are borderline, the FAQ addresses the most common ones directly.

The tradition developed ashtakoot as a tool for comparing two charts efficiently using the most emotionally and instinctively relevant data point in Jyotish: the Moon. The Moon's nakshatra and rashi describe how a person feels, receives, and responds at a baseline level. Compatibility at that level matters. It is not the only thing that matters, and the score is not a sentence. It is a reading of one dimension of a relationship, computed from two points of data, by a tradition that also knew the rest of the chart existed.