Sixteen zones
Every room scored against the zone it occupies — what that zone governs, and what it resists.
VastuAI is part of the Pro plan. Everything on this page is free to read — the classical tables below are the same ones the analyser scores a floor plan against.
See plansVastu Shastra analysis for your actual floor plan
Most Vastu advice is generic: put the kitchen in the south-east, keep the centre open. It is not wrong, and it cannot tell you anything about your building. VastuAI takes the plan you have — its outline, its centre and the direction it faces — and scores every room against the classical grid, naming the defects it finds and what can be done about each one.
What Vastu Shastra actually is
Vastu Shastra is the Indian tradition of building placement. Its claim is narrow and worth stating plainly: where a thing sits inside a building changes how that building is used, and the tradition holds that direction is what decides where things should sit.
The reasoning runs through the five elements. Each direction is assigned an element, a ruling planet and a guardian, and a room is placed where its element agrees with the direction's. A kitchen belongs in the south-east not because a list says so, but because the south-east carries fire. Once that is clear, most of the rules stop needing to be memorised — they can be derived.
The building itself is treated as a body. The Vastu Purusha Mandala lays a grid over the plot, with a figure pinned across it and forty-five devatas holding him down, one to a square. The centre — the Brahmasthan — is his navel, and is meant to stay open and unloaded. A staircase or a toilet landing there is the single defect classical texts treat most seriously.
Everything on this page is that tradition set out in full: the sixteen zones, the thirty-two entrance positions and the forty-five devatas, exactly as the analyser scores a plan against them.
What the analyser checks
Each of these is a separate engine with its own classical basis. They run over the same marked-up plan, so a defect found by one is reconciled against the others rather than reported twice.
Thirty-two entrance padas
The main door placed on the boundary grid and read against the devata that owns that position.
Vastu Purusha Mandala
The 81-pada grid and its 45 devatas laid over the plan, with the Brahmasthan checked for load.
Marma points
The grid intersections your walls, beams and columns actually cross — the classical piercing defects.
Plot shape
The outline classified, with the extensions and cuts that change how a plot is read.
Room placement
Kitchen, bedroom, pooja, toilet, stairs and entrance, each against its own rule set.
Energy heatmap
The plan shaded by zone strength, so a weak quarter is visible rather than inferred from a list.
Three-tier remedies
Ranked by what the defect actually is — no-build fixes first, structural change last.
Astrology overlay
Optional: the property read against each occupant’s chart, not just against the building.
How it works
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1
Start from your plan
Upload a floor-plan image, pick a template, or draw the outline. Auto-detection will find rooms and walls on an uploaded plan; you can correct anything it gets wrong.
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2
Mark centre, boundary and north
Three marks are all the geometry needs. North can come from a compass reading or from the plan’s own north arrow.
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Read the audit
Zone scores, the defect list ordered by weight, ranked remedies, the heatmap, and a report you can share or export.
Where each room belongs
The zone table below is keyed by direction. Most people arrive holding a room instead — where does the kitchen go, which way should the main door face — so here is the same classical source turned round, room first. It is computed from the zone list rather than written separately, so the two can never disagree.
| Room or use | Favourable zones | Zones to avoid |
|---|---|---|
| Kitchen |
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| Storage / store-room |
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| Toilet / bathroom |
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| Pooja room |
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| Water source |
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| Cash safe / locker |
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| Dining room |
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Nothing rules it out |
| Garden / open space |
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| Main entrance |
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| Master bedroom |
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| Study / home office |
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Nothing rules it out |
| Bedroom (general) | No zone favours it on its own |
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| Children's bedroom |
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| Daughter's bedroom |
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| Guest bedroom |
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Nothing rules it out |
| Living room |
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Nothing rules it out |
| Staircase | No zone favours it on its own |
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| Son's bedroom |
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Nothing rules it out |
Hover a zone to see the exact classical wording. A bold ! marks a rule the tradition states emphatically — a toilet in the north-east and a kitchen in the south-east are the two most-cited. This is the general rule; whether it applies to your building depends on where the centre actually falls, which is what the analyser works out.
Which direction should the main door face?
All 32 padas →This is the most-asked Vastu question, and "east or north" is too coarse an answer. Each wall is divided into padas, and the classical reading depends on which pada the door occupies — two doors on the same wall, a few feet apart, are read quite differently.
East wall
5 of 9 padas worth using (56%)
Best positions: pada 2 (Parjanya), pada 3 (Jayanta), pada 4 (Indra)
South wall
0 of 9 padas worth using (0%)
No pada on this wall is rated favourable. A door here is read as a defect to be compensated for, not placed well.
West wall
4 of 9 padas worth using (44%)
Best positions: pada 21 (Varuna)
North wall
5 of 5 padas worth using (100%)
Best positions: pada 28 (Bhallata), pada 29 (Soma)
Why the zones say what they say
The sixteen zones are not an arbitrary list to be learned. They are the five elements distributed around the compass — which is why the rules can be reasoned about rather than only looked up. Grouped by element, the same sixteen zones look like this.
Water · 5 zones
North, North-North-East, North-East, East-North-East, West
Suits: Cash safe, main entrance, study room, water sources, Pooja room, water (well, fountain), open space, Pooja, study, water...
Air · 5 zones
East, East-South-East, West-North-West, North-West, North-North-West
Suits: Main entrance, living room windows, balcony, Sun-facing pooja, study, awards display, Guest room, dining, lounge, Guest...
Fire · 3 zones
South-East, South-South-East, South
Suits: KITCHEN (best), electric panel, generator, geyser, Son's bedroom (active phase), gym, fireplace, Master bedroom (head so...
Earth · 3 zones
South-South-West, South-West, West-South-West
Suits: Heavy items, ancestor altar, safe (under direction), MASTER BEDROOM (best), heavy furniture, locker room, Library, store...
The sixteen zones
Full zone reference →Vastu splits each of the eight directions in two, giving sixteen zones of 22.5° each. The split matters: the two halves of one direction sit either side of a corner and support quite different activities.
| Zone | Deity | Governs |
|---|---|---|
| North N | Kubera | Wealth, career growth, opportunity flow |
| North-North-East NNE | Soma | Mental peace, meditation, healing |
| North-East NE | Ishaan (Shiva) | Divine grace, wisdom, knowledge, children |
| East-North-East ENE | Surya | Health, vitality, self-confidence, sons |
| East E | Indra | Prosperity, social status, vitality |
| East-South-East ESE | Satya | Truth, fame, recognition |
| South-East SE | Agni | Cooking fire, digestion, finance health, female energy |
| South-South-East SSE | Pushan | Energy, drive, ambition, male health |
| South S | Yama | Stability, longevity, accumulated dharma |
| South-South-West SSW | Nirruti | Ancestral karma, hidden weakness, expense control |
| South-West SW | Nirruti / Pitru | Authority, master of house, longevity, stability |
| West-South-West WSW | Varuna (W. expansion) | Expenditure, education, expense karma |
| West W | Varuna | Gains from delayed effort, profit conversion, food |
| West-North-West WNW | Vayu (W. expansion) | Movement of resources, guest gains, women's social ties |
| North-West NW | Vayu | Friendship, women, support network, romantic relationships |
| North-North-West NNW | Roga (illness, transformed by Vayu) | Support and stress balance, female friendships |
What you get back
An audit, not a verdict. Every line says which rule produced it, so you can disagree with a finding on its own terms rather than taking a number on trust.
A score per zone, with its reason
Each of the sixteen zones scored for what it holds, naming the rule behind the score. A weak quarter is shown on the plan, not left to be inferred from a list.
A defect list, ordered by weight
Defects ranked by how much they actually matter, so a pierced marma point is not buried under a misplaced dustbin.
Remedies in three tiers
No-build fixes first — what to move, what to add. Object-level next. Structural change last, and only where nothing lighter will do.
The Brahmasthan, checked for load
The centre assessed for what is standing on it. This is the defect the classical texts treat most seriously, and the one most commonly missed.
Marma points against your walls
The grid intersections your actual walls, beams and columns cross — computed from your outline, not from a diagram of a generic house.
A report you can send on
A PDF for a client, a builder or your own records, with the plan, the scores and the reasoning in one document.
Who uses it
Before you buy
Read a listing’s plan before committing. The defects that cannot be fixed later — the centre, the slope, the entrance position — are exactly the ones worth knowing first.
Before you build
Changing a plan on screen costs nothing. Moving a wall afterwards does not.
A home you already own
Most findings in a finished house resolve to something you can move rather than something you must rebuild. The remedies are ranked with that in mind.
Consultants and astrologers
Run a client’s plan, check the reasoning, export a report under your own contact details. The workings are shown, so it can be checked rather than relayed.
What Vastu does not claim
Worth saying, because a great deal of Vastu writing implies otherwise and it makes the rest harder to take seriously.
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It is not a guarantee, and no arrangement of rooms secures an outcome.
The tradition describes tendencies in how a space is used. It does not promise wealth, health or a marriage, and anyone selling it that way is selling something else.
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A defect is not a disaster.
Almost every real building carries several. They are read together and weighted, which is why a list of faults is less useful than an audit that ranks them.
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It is not a substitute for anything structural.
A damp wall, an unsafe stair or a failing beam is a building problem. Vastu has nothing to say about it and should not be asked.
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It is not medicine, and not a diagnosis.
Where classical texts associate a zone with health, that is the tradition’s own language. It is not a clinical claim and should not be read as one.
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Not every school agrees.
Where traditions differ, the analyser follows the mainstream Parashari-aligned reading and says which rule it applied, so you can see where another school would diverge.
Go deeper
The 16 Vastu Zones
Vastu divides a building into sixteen directional zones, each with its own deity, element, ruling planet and set of activities it supports or resists. These are the zones the VastuAI analyser scores every room against.
The 32 Entrance Padas
The boundary of a plot is divided into thirty-two entrance positions, eight to a side. Each is owned by a devata and each is classically held to bring a particular result — which is why the main door is the single most consequential decision in Vastu.
The Vastu Purusha Mandala
The Vastu Purusha Mandala maps a building onto a grid of 81 squares occupied by 45 devatas — thirty-two around the border and thirteen within, with Brahma at the centre. It is the frame every other Vastu rule sits on.
What is free, and what Pro buys
The tables on these pages are classical and free to read — the zones, the entrance padas and the mandala are not ours to sell. What the Pro plan buys is having your own floor plan scored against them: the audit, the defect list, ranked remedies, the energy heatmap, the astrology overlay, property comparison and the shareable report.
Frequently asked
Do I need my birth details for a Vastu analysis?
No. A Vastu analysis is about the building — its orientation, its boundary and where each room sits. Birth details are optional, and only used if you want the astrology overlay, which reads the property against each occupant's chart rather than against the building alone.
What do I need to get a Vastu report?
A floor plan and the direction the building faces. You can upload a plan image and mark the centre, the boundary and north on it, start from a built-in template, or draw the outline yourself. The analyser needs the outline and the compass; everything else it derives.
Which direction should the main door face as per Vastu?
North and East are the favoured walls, but the wall is only half the answer: each wall is divided into padas, and the classical reading depends on which pada the door occupies. Two doors on the same east wall, a few feet apart, are read quite differently — one can fall on Indra and another on a pada associated with loss. The analyser places your actual door on the 32-pada grid rather than rounding it to a compass direction.
What is the most serious Vastu defect?
Classical texts treat a loaded or obstructed Brahmasthan — the centre of the plot — as the gravest, because the centre is where the Vastu Purusha's navel falls. A staircase, a toilet or a heavy column landing there outweighs most other findings. A toilet in the North-East is the next most commonly cited.
Can Vastu defects be fixed without demolition?
Usually, yes. Most findings in a finished building resolve to something that can be moved, added or re-purposed rather than rebuilt, which is why remedies are ranked in three tiers: no-build changes first, object-level next, and structural work last and only where nothing lighter will do. A report that recommends demolition as a first resort is not reading the defect weights.
Does Vastu apply to flats and apartments?
Yes, and the method is the same — the flat's own outline becomes the plot. What changes is the scope of the remedy: a shared wall, the building entrance and the position of the block are outside your control, so the analysis weights what you can actually act on inside your own boundary.
Does Vastu apply to an office, shop or factory?
The zone logic is identical, because it is about direction rather than about houses. What differs is the use placed in each zone: a cash safe, a server room or a furnace is read by what it is — weight, fire, water, wealth — in the same way a bedroom or a kitchen is. Mark the rooms for what they actually are and the same rules apply.
Vastu or Feng Shui — are they the same thing?
They are separate traditions that arrive at similar-sounding ideas. Vastu is Indian, tied to the Vastu Purusha Mandala, the five elements and a fixed assignment of directions. Feng Shui is Chinese, and its compass schools depend on the building's construction date in a way Vastu does not. Mixing their rules produces contradictions, so this analyser follows Vastu only and says which rule it applied.
How accurate does north have to be?
It matters more than most people expect. The sixteen zones are 22.5° wide, so an error of ten degrees can move a room from one zone into its neighbour and change what the rule says. Take the reading away from steel and electronics, or use the plan's own north arrow if it was surveyed.
My house has several Vastu defects. Is that bad?
Almost every real building has several. Defects are read together and weighted, not counted — which is why a ranked audit is more useful than a list of faults. A building with six light findings can read better than one with a single loaded centre.
Can I use this for a client, as a consultant?
Yes. Projects are saved per plan, the reasoning behind every score is shown so it can be checked rather than relayed on trust, and reports can be exported under your own contact details on the Pro plan.
Is VastuAI free?
The reference tables on these pages are free to read. Running your own floor plan through the analyser — the zone scoring, defect list, remedies, heatmap and report — is part of the Pro plan.
Not sure what your chart is telling you?
Talk it through with an astrologer — your charts and reports are already on file, so there is nothing to re-enter.