Choghadiya tomorrow — the two things that change overnight

Two independent things change overnight, and conflating them is why "tomorrow’s choghadiya" feels unpredictable. The names rotate by a fixed step — 3 places along the cycle — because the weekday turns over. The clock times slide because sunrise moved, by up to 70s in New Delhi and only 40s in Bangalore.

choghadiya tomorrow — the two things that change overnight, choghadiya, chogadia, shubh muhurat

The names rotate by a fixed step because the weekday turns over. The clock times slide by an amount that depends on the date and your latitude. They are separate problems.

If you looked up choghadiya today and want to plan tomorrow, the useful question is not "what is tomorrow’s table" but "how far will it have moved". Those are different questions with different answers, and the second one is the one that decides whether you can reuse today’s timings.

The name half is fixed and knowable. Tomorrow is a different weekday, so its daylight opens 3 places further along the cycle than today’s. Nothing about the date, the season or your city changes that — it is the same 3 in Chennai in January as in Delhi in June.

The clock half is not fixed at all. Every slot begins at a boundary derived from sunrise and sunset, so as those move through the year the entire grid slides and stretches. Near an equinox it moves noticeably in a single day; within a week of a solstice it barely moves at all.

What the names do: a fixed rotation

Because the openers walk the cycle by 3 per weekday, tomorrow’s entire daylight row is today’s row rotated by 3. Every name still appears, in the same order; you have simply entered the loop three places further on.

Concretely, Sunday daylight runs Udveg → Chal → Labh → Amrit → Kaal → Shubh → Rog → Udveg. Monday runs Amrit → Kaal → Shubh → Rog → Udveg → Chal → Labh → Amrit. The second row is the first with the entry point moved, not a new arrangement.

The practical consequence: a slot that was favourable at a given position today will very likely not be tomorrow, and there is no shortcut around checking. But you never have to learn seven tables — one cycle and one entry rule is the whole thing.

Weekday	Opens on	Position in the cycle
Sunday	Udveg	0
Monday	Amrit	3
Tuesday	Rog	6
Wednesday	Labh	2
Thursday	Shubh	5
Friday	Chal	1
Saturday	Kaal	4

Positions index into the fixed seven-name cycle. Consecutive weekdays differ by 3, wrapping at 7.

What the clock does: a slide that depends on the date

Measured, city by city, over every consecutive pair of days in the reference year.

The largest single-day movement of sunrise anywhere in this set is 70s, in New Delhi around 24 March. The smallest maximum is Bangalore’s 40s. Latitude is why: the further from the equator, the harder sunrise swings through the year, and the faster it moves on the days when it is moving at all.

The same movement stretches the slots. On its fastest day New Delhi sees one daylight choghadiya change length by about 13s — small in isolation, but it compounds across the eight slots, so the last slot of the day shifts by roughly eight times that.

Near a solstice the drift collapses to almost nothing: on 21 June the sunrise in New Delhi moves 12s from the day before. That is the honest answer to "can I reuse today’s timings tomorrow" — in late June, very nearly yes; in late March, not if you care about ten minutes.

City	Fastest sunrise drift in a day	On (approx.)	Slot length change that day	Drift at the June solstice
Ahmedabad	58s	25 March	10s	13s
Mumbai	51s	25 March	8s	13s
New Delhi	70s	24 March	13s	12s
Surat	55s	25 March	9s	13s
Rajkot	57s	25 March	10s	13s
Vadodara	57s	25 March	10s	13s
Pune	50s	25 March	8s	13s
Bangalore	40s	26 March	5s	13s
Hyderabad	48s	25 March	7s	13s
Jaipur	66s	25 March	12s	12s
Chennai	40s	26 March	5s	13s

Computed from NOAA solar-position sunrise for every consecutive pair of days in the reference year at each city’s own coordinates. Rounded to the second; the underlying figures are continuous.

When today’s table is good enough for tomorrow

Putting the two halves together gives a usable rule. The names are never reusable — the weekday changed, so the row changed. The clock boundaries usually are, within a tolerance you should pick deliberately rather than by accident.

If you can live with five minutes of slop, today’s boundaries hold for tomorrow almost everywhere in India on almost every date, since even the fastest drift here is under 120s of sunrise movement. If you are timing something to the minute — a registration slot, a scheduled call — recompute, particularly in March and September.

The one case where reuse fails badly is planning more than a few days ahead. Drift accumulates: a fortnight either side of an equinox moves sunrise by a quarter of an hour in northern India, which is a fifth of a slot. At that point you are not reading tomorrow’s table, you are reading a stale one.

What does not change overnight at all

The number of slots is always eight per half. The cycle order never varies. The rule that the eighth slot repeats the first never varies. And the choghadiya layer’s standing below Rahu Kaal, the tithi and a properly elected muhurat does not change either — a favourable slot tomorrow is still only favourable within that layer.

Nor does the system acquire any personal component overnight. Tomorrow’s table is identical for everyone in your city regardless of chart, and this page will not pretend otherwise.

Reading tomorrow in three steps

The whole procedure, in the order that avoids the two common mistakes.

1. Take tomorrow’s weekday, not today’s

The row is chosen by the weekday that begins at tomorrow’s sunrise. If you are planning something at 02:00, that is still tonight’s row — the vedic day has not turned over.

2. Get tomorrow’s sunrise and sunset for your own city

Not a nearby metro. Sunrise varies by more than 40 minutes across India on the same date, because one timezone spans nearly 30 degrees of longitude.

3. Divide, do not assume 90 minutes

Daylight ÷ 8 for the day slots, and (24 hours − daylight) ÷ 8 for the night. The 90-minute figure is only true within a few days of an equinox.

How far the grid slides overnight in New Delhi, at its worst

New Delhi has the largest single-day sunrise movement of the eleven cities in this cluster. This is that day, and what it does to the eight daylight boundaries.

Step	Value
Date of fastest drift	24 March — sunrise moves 70s from the previous day
Effect on one slot	each daylight choghadiya changes length by about 13s
Effect on the last boundary of the day	sunrise shift + 8 × slot change ≈ 173s
Same measurement at the solstice	12s of sunrise movement — effectively frozen

Even on its worst day the whole grid moves by roughly 173s end to end, which is why reusing yesterday’s boundaries is fine for an errand and wrong for an appointment. In midsummer the same comparison is 12s.

These are movements of the boundaries, not of the names. The names changed completely, because the weekday did.

Frequently asked

Will tomorrow’s choghadiya be the same as today’s?

No. The names rotate by 3 places because the weekday turns over, so a slot that was Amrit today will not be Amrit at the same position tomorrow. The clock boundaries also move, by anything from a couple of seconds near a solstice to about 70s near an equinox.

How much does choghadiya change from day to day?

In name, completely — the whole row rotates. In time, very little: the largest single-day sunrise movement across the eleven Indian cities measured here is 70s (New Delhi, around 24 March), and the smallest maximum is 40s in Bangalore.

Can I use today’s choghadiya timings for tomorrow?

For the boundaries, within about five minutes, yes almost anywhere in India on almost any date. For the names, no — those depend on the weekday and change every day. And do not extend it much beyond tomorrow: drift accumulates to roughly a quarter of an hour over a fortnight near the equinoxes.

Why do choghadiya timings shift through the year?

Because every slot is a fraction of the daylight, and daylight is not constant. As sunrise and sunset move with the season the eight boundaries slide and stretch together. Slot length in Indian cities runs from about 1h 17m in late December to about 1h 45m in late June, depending on latitude.

Does the choghadiya change at midnight?

No. The vedic day runs sunrise to sunrise, so tomorrow’s row does not begin until tomorrow’s sunrise. Anything you do at 01:00 is still on tonight’s night table.

What this page can NOT tell you

• This page does not print tomorrow’s times. It cannot: a static page has no idea where you are, and a table computed at build time would be wrong for every city it was not computed for.
• The drift figures are for the reference year. Sunrise repeats to within seconds across years, so they are stable — but they are a description of a normal year, not a forecast of a particular date.
• Nothing here accounts for daylight saving. All eleven cities are on IST, which does not observe it; a city that does would see its whole grid jump an hour on the changeover date.
• A favourable slot tomorrow is still only a preference within one layer of one convention. It does not outrank Rahu Kaal, the tithi, or a properly elected muhurat, and it knows nothing about you.

Choghadiya is a folk-electional convention, not a prediction. It labels slices of the day by tradition; it does not know what you are doing, who you are, or how it turned out. Treat a label as a preference, and never as permission or prohibition.

How AskSoma computes and what we refuse to claim · Engine: NOAA solar position (sunrise/sunset), ±1 minute against published almanac times · Ayanamsa: not used — choghadiya is a sunrise-to-sunset division, with no sidereal component · Content reviewed 2026-08-08