Summary: Locational astrology, also called astrocartography, shows how the places we live, travel, and dream about resonate with our birth chart. It reveals where our energy flows best in the world.
What Is Locational Astrology?
Locational astrology (also known as astrocartography) is the art and science of connecting your birth chart to the geography of Earth. It maps your planets onto a world map, showing where each celestial body rises, sets, or reaches its highest and lowest points. The result is a personalized “star map” of your life on the globe.
The word astrocartography literally means “star mapping.” It was developed and popularized by astrologer Jim Lewis in the 1970s, combining mathematical precision with the poetic idea that we are all tuned to certain places more than others.
How It Works
Your natal chart is a snapshot of the sky at the moment you were born. Astrocartography takes that same chart and projects it onto Earth’s surface, drawing lines where each planet was rising, setting, culminating, or at its nadir at your birth moment. These are called planetary lines.
- Sun Line: Where you shine naturally — confidence, leadership, vitality.
- Moon Line: Emotional comfort, family, home, and intuition.
- Mercury Line: Communication, writing, learning, and travel.
- Venus Line: Love, art, beauty, money, and ease.
- Mars Line: Drive, ambition, physical energy, and courage.
- Jupiter Line: Luck, growth, opportunity, and expansion.
- Saturn Line: Structure, work, discipline, and lessons.
- Uranus Line: Freedom, innovation, and unexpected change.
- Neptune Line: Spirituality, creativity, and sometimes confusion.
- Pluto Line: Transformation, intensity, and deep empowerment.
Each line represents an energy that feels stronger in that region. Living or traveling near those lines can activate different aspects of your personality, depending on which planet is emphasized.
Finding Your Best Places
Using astrocartography maps, you can discover the locations that align most harmoniously with your goals:
- Career Growth: Look to your Sun, Jupiter, or Saturn lines.
- Love and Relationships: Explore your Venus or Moon lines.
- Creativity and Inspiration: Follow Neptune or Mercury lines.
- Transformation and Reinvention: Pluto and Uranus lines bring major life shifts.
You don’t have to move across the world to feel these influences—sometimes even traveling or connecting online with certain regions can “activate” that energy in your chart.
The Mathematics Behind It
Astrocartography is based on pure astronomy and geometry. It uses your exact birth time, date, and location to calculate the angular positions of planets relative to Earth’s latitude and longitude. Modern software projects these calculations onto a world map, creating precise planetary meridians.
It’s astrology’s way of turning numbers into navigation — a blend of science and soul that reminds us we’re citizens of both heaven and Earth.
Practical Uses
- Choosing where to live: Find places that align with comfort, opportunity, or peace.
- Planning travel: Understand how certain trips can inspire, challenge, or transform you.
- Remote activation: Bringing items, art, or connections from certain regions into your space to invite that planetary energy without moving.
- Personal growth: Reflecting on how different environments bring out different versions of yourself.
The Takeaway
Locational astrology reveals that the world itself is alive with your chart’s energy. Every city, mountain, and shoreline carries a different frequency for you. When you learn which places resonate with your soul, the map becomes more than geography — it becomes guidance.
Whether you’re searching for love, purpose, or peace, the stars already drew your map long before you arrived. Astrocartography simply helps you read it.