Tick the vrats you keep above, choose your town and a year from 1900 to 2074, and this free tool makes your own vrat calendar: every date of those vrats in that year at your town, in date order, with the tithi, the lunar month and the timing that matters for each, such as the parana window after Ekadashi, the moonrise on Sankashti Chaturthi or the evening Pradosh window. Add a weekly fast and every date of that weekday is listed too. Print it on A4 (portrait) and keep it on the wall, or tick “remember” and the tool keeps your choices on this device for next time.
How it works
The dates come from the festival engine behind every festival page on this site, run for your town and year in your browser. Each vrat has its own rule, set out on its festival page where it has one: Ekadashi is kept on the day it is in force at sunrise (the Smarta rule), with the special cases that page explains; the Purnima vrat on the day Purnima is in force in the midday part of the day (Madhyahna); Amavasya on the day it is in force in the afternoon (Aparahna); Sankashti Chaturthi on the day Krishna Chaturthi is in force at moonrise; Pradosh vrat on the evening Trayodashi is in force in the first part of the night after sunset (Pradosh); Masik Shivaratri, which has no page of its own, on the night Krishna Chaturdashi is in force at midnight (Nishita), the rule of our Maha Shivaratri page, because the Dharma Sindhu, in its rules for each tithi (on Chaturdashi), says the Shivaratri vrat of every Krishna Chaturdashi is kept as Maha Shivaratri is, with Chaturdashi lasting to midnight. The yearly vrats, from Maha Shivaratri and Navratri to Karva Chauth and the Teej days, follow the rules on their own pages. Sunrise, sunset and moonrise are worked out for your town, in its local time with daylight saving.
The plan shows exactly the dates and timings that the festival dates tool gives for the same town and year; it only keeps the vrats you ticked. We also checked the plan against an independent calculation (the Swiss Ephemeris, with each vrat’s rule written out again) for New Delhi, London, Sydney and New York in 1900, 2026, 2027 and 2074, and for eight more test years at towns in India, Fiji, England and the United States: 2,441 of 2,442 dates were the same, and the one other, an Ekadashi in Sydney, turned on eight seconds of sunrise and came out the same when the reference used our sunrise convention.
Reading the result
The table lists each vrat day with its weekday, the vrat’s name (linked to its page), the tithi and the amanta month, with the purnimanta name where it differs, and the key timing. For Ekadashi the timing is the parana window on the next morning, when the fast is broken. The number of vrats changes from year to year: in New Delhi, for example, there are 24 Ekadashis in 2026 and 25 in 2027. A weekly fast is shown below the table, month by month. The print button prints the plan on its own, without the rest of the page.
Where traditions differ
The plan follows the Smarta rules with amanta months, the default of the major printed panchangs and of this site. Some Vaishnava traditions follow a stricter Ekadashi rule that can put the fast a day later in some months, as the Ekadashi page explains, so if you follow a Vaishnava sampradaya, check its calendar. North India counts months purnimanta, so the same day can carry the next month’s name; the day itself does not change. A vrat can fall a day apart in two cities because sunrise, moonrise and the clock differ. If your family or temple keeps another day, follow them.
What it does not do
It does not tell you how to keep a vrat, what to eat or whether you should fast: a fast is a personal practice, and anyone with a health condition, pregnant or on medicines should ask a doctor first. It does not add personal dates such as a shraddha (use the shraddha tithi calculator) or a Hindu birthday (use the Hindu birthday calculator). A timing that has no proper window on its date is marked as not given: this happens when the tithi that sets the window ends before the window opens, such as a Dwadashi that ends before sunrise on the morning of an Ekadashi parana (with every vrat ticked, 4 of 19,939 entries at New Delhi from 1900 to 2074, and none at London), and more often far north or south, where the Sun can rise very late, set very early or not rise or set at all. At such places a date that cannot be worked out at all is left out. For every festival of a year, not only the vrats you keep, use the festival dates tool or the printable Hindu calendar.
Frequently asked questions
↳ How do I make a vrat calendar for my family?
Tick the vrats your family keeps, choose your town and the year, and press the button. The plan lists every date with its timing, and the print button prints it on its own on A4.
↳ Why does my town matter?
Each vrat depends on the tithi at a certain time of day, such as sunrise, midday, the evening or moonrise, and those times differ from town to town. A vrat can therefore fall on different dates in India and abroad, or even in two Indian cities.
↳ Which Ekadashi dates does it use?
The Smarta dates, kept on the day Ekadashi is in force at sunrise, with the parana window on the next morning. You can tick both fortnights, or only the bright or the dark one.
↳ Can I add a weekly fast?
Yes. Choose the weekday, for example every Monday, and every date of that weekday in the year is listed below the table, month by month.
↳ Are my choices saved?
Only on this device, in your browser, if you leave "remember my choices" ticked. They are not sent to us. Untick it to clear them.
↳ Why are there 24 Ekadashis in one year and 25 in another?
A lunar month is shorter than a calendar month: our tables hold 2,165 new moons in the 175 years from 1900 to 2074, about twelve and a third a year, with two Ekadashis in each lunar month. Some years therefore hold one more Ekadashi than others, and the same is true of the other monthly vrats.