Free Zi Wei Dou Shu Chart: Cast the Twelve Palaces, Then Read Them in Three Steps
For the same moment of birth, BaZi writes four pairs of stems and branches, while Zi Wei Dou Shu (often called Purple Star Astrology in English) spreads it out into twelve palaces and more than a hundred stars. Its strength is a clear division of labour: character sits in the Life Palace, love in the Spouse Palace, work in the Career Palace, so you turn to the box that matches your question. Cast your chart first, then follow the three steps below; that is far easier than memorising the stars up front.
Free Zi Wei Dou Shu chart
Enter your date of birth (Western calendar), birth time and sex to cast the twelve palaces with the fourteen major stars and their brightness, the six auspicious and six Sha stars, and the birth-year Four Transformations. You can also lay the decade and year transformations and palaces over your natal chart. Add a birthplace to correct for true solar time. Everything is calculated in your browser; nothing is uploaded.
Stars are placed by the San He method of the Complete Book of Zi Wei Dou Shu. The birth year changes at Chinese New Year; births after 11 pm count as the Zi hour of the next day; in a leap month, days 1–15 count as the month itself and days 16 onward as the next month. If you only know the two-hour period, enter its midpoint (for the Si period, 10:00).
Reading a chart in three steps
- Start with the major star in the Life Palace. The Life Palace is the lead character of the whole chart, and its major star sets the base colour of your temperament: Zi Wei wants to lead, Tian Ji likes to think, Qi Sha wants to go its own way. A Life Palace with no major star (an empty palace) is common too; then you borrow the stars of the opposite palace. See the fourteen major stars and Life Palace and Body Palace.
- Then look at the three sides and four directions. No palace works alone. You read it together with the palace opposite and the two palaces in a trine with it. For the Life Palace, that means the Life, Wealth, Career and Travel palaces, which together describe how a person works, earns and moves through the world. See the twelve palaces.
- Finally, see where the Four Transformations land. The heavenly stem of your birth year turns four stars into Hua Lu, Hua Quan, Hua Ke and Hua Ji. The palace with Hua Lu is where things tend to go smoothly for you; the palace with Hua Ji is where you care most and keep turning things over. See the Four Transformations.
After these three steps you have the outline of your chart. Leave the decades (a new palace every ten years) and annual charts until the natal chart feels familiar (the tool above can overlay them for you); otherwise it is easy to mistake a ten-year phase for a lifelong trait.
What 16,802 charts tell us
How we counted: this site’s engine cast one Zi Wei chart for every day from 1960 to 2005 (birth hour drawn by a fixed-seed random sample), 16,802 charts in all. These figures describe how chart structures are distributed; they say nothing about whether anyone’s destiny is good or bad.
The last two numbers deserve a second look. Plenty of articles call a palace “bad” as soon as a Sha star shows up, yet nearly nine people in ten have one somewhere around the Life Palace. Sha stars are the norm, not the exception. What matters is which stars they sit with, how bright the major star is, and whether auspicious stars soften them; the page on the six auspicious and six Sha stars goes into detail.
How this site casts a chart
Zi Wei Dou Shu has many schools, and the same birthday can produce slightly different charts on different sites. Usually one of the settings below differs; it does not mean anyone made a mistake. This site follows the San He school and the star placement of the Complete Book of Zi Wei Dou Shu. We checked the engine against the open-source iztro library on twenty thousand random charts and every one matched.
| Setting | This site | Other common practice |
|---|---|---|
| Start of the year | Chinese New Year (1st day of the 1st lunar month) | A few use Li Chun, as BaZi does |
| Late Zi hour (23:00–24:00) | Counts as the Zi hour of the next day | Counts as the Zi hour of the same day |
| Leap months | Days 1–15 count as that month, days 16+ as the next | The whole leap month as that month, or as the next |
| Geng-stem transformations | Tai Yang Lu, Wu Qu Quan, Tai Yin Ke, Tian Tong Ji | Tai Yang Lu, Wu Qu Quan, Tian Tong Ke, Tai Yin Ji |
| Ren-stem transformations | Tian Liang Lu, Zi Wei Quan, Zuo Fu Ke, Wu Qu Ji | Tian Fu instead of Zuo Fu for Ke |
| Tian Kui and Tian Yue | The standard rhyme: Jia, Wu, Geng to Chou and Wei; Yi, Ji to Zi and Shen; Bing, Ding to Hai and You; Ren, Gui to Mao and Si; Xin to Wu and Yin | Other versions exist for Geng and Xin |
| Brightness of the major stars | The table of the Complete Book | Tables differ between schools; the biggest single source of differences |
If you compare our chart with another site, check these settings first. If the settings match and the charts still differ, please write to us.
Where to start
Want a worked example? Every person in our famous charts section has a Zi Wei chart cast from the same true solar time, read side by side with the BaZi chart, including the places where the two disagree.
A straight word: a chart is a map, not a verdict
Zi Wei Dou Shu turns the moment of birth into twelve palaces and more than a hundred stars, which gives you a vocabulary for talking about your temperament, your relationships and the stages of your life. It can show tendencies and help you sort your thoughts, but it cannot make decisions for you, and it should never be used to frighten yourself. Everything on this site is for reference and entertainment; for health, investment or legal questions, please see a qualified professional.
Want another angle on the same birth time?
BaZi reads the Four Pillars for the strength and balance of the five elements, which complements the palace view of Zi Wei. The link under your chart, “See the BaZi chart for the same birth data”, takes you straight there.
Zi Wei Dou Shu: FAQ
Which is more accurate, Zi Wei Dou Shu or BaZi?
Both start from the same moment of birth and organise it differently: BaZi looks at the balance of the five elements and which ones help you, Zi Wei looks at which stars sit in which palaces. BaZi is good at judging overall strength and the direction of each period; Zi Wei is good at splitting life into twelve areas and describing each one. Treat them as two angles rather than rivals; see BaZi vs Zi Wei Dou Shu.
Can I cast a Zi Wei chart without my birth time?
Not a complete one. The Life Palace depends on the birth month and hour, and a different hour moves the Life Palace, the Body Palace, the bureau and most of the stars. If you only know a rough window, cast the two or three possible hours and see which chart fits your character and history best.
Why does my chart look different on another site?
The usual causes are whether the late Zi hour changes the date, how leap months are handled, which version of the Geng and Ren transformations is used, and the brightness table. The settings table above lists ours so you can compare point by point. Another common cause is whether true solar time was applied.
Is an empty Life Palace bad?
No. In our sample about 16.4% of people have no major star in the Life Palace; the traditional method borrows the stars of the opposite (Travel) palace. People with an empty Life Palace often adapt readily to their surroundings, and the minor stars and transformations in the palace show more clearly. See Life Palace and Body Palace.
Is Hua Ji in the Life Palace a bad sign?
Hua Ji stands for fixation, caring deeply and going over things again and again; it is not a disaster. In the Life Palace it often shows as high standards for yourself and a tendency to overthink, and also as unusual focus. About 8.5% of people in our sample have the birth-year Hua Ji in the Life Palace. See the Four Transformations.