℞ Free Retrograde Calculator: Where Does It Fall in Your Birth Chart?

A retrograde described as being 'in Scorpio' is a fact about the sky.

A sign is not an aspect. Most guides say a retrograde 'affects' everyone with a placement in the sign it is in. That mixes two different things. The retrograde sweeps a stretch of the zodiac, from the degree where the planet will later turn direct to the degree where it turned retrograde; that stretch falls in some houses of your chart. Separately, it makes aspects to your planets, and only an aspect whose exact degree lies inside that stretch is ever passed. Umbriel keeps the two apart.

Three passes, not one. A degree inside the stretch is crossed three times: once going forward before the planet turns, once going back during the retrograde, and once more going forward after it turns direct. That is why a retrograde can bring the same subject up, revisit it and settle it. The card gives all three dates for every contact.

The two retrogrades that matter this month. Venus turns retrograde on 3 October 2026 at 8°29′ Scorpio and direct on 14 November 2026 at 22°51′ Libra, with its shadow running from 31 August 2026 to 15 December 2026. Mercury turns retrograde on 24 October 2026 at 20°58′ Scorpio and direct on 13 November 2026 at 5°02′ Scorpio, with its shadow from 4 October 2026 to 30 November 2026. Those are the sky's dates, the same for everyone. Which of your houses and planets they touch is the part only your chart can answer.

The shadow. Before it turns retrograde a planet covers, going forward, the ground it will later cover twice more; that earlier stretch is the pre-shadow, and the matching stretch after it turns direct is the post-shadow. The card includes both, so a contact that falls in the shadow is found even if it is exact before the retrograde proper begins.

What to do with it. Retrograde is traditionally read as a review window. A practical use of this card is to take the exact dates of the contacts and, on each, notice what in that area of life you already had on your mind and write one line about it. It is an experiment to run, not a forecast.

No birth time? The planets still work and their dates are exact. Without a time the houses and the contacts to the Ascendant and Midheaven are left out, and the card says so.

The retrograde cycle of Mercury, Venus or Mars (the shadow's start, the turn to retrograde, the turn to direct and the shadow's end) comes from the engine's station finder and planet positions, the same ones that fill the Retrograde Calendar, and the stations agree with NASA's JPL Horizons to within a minute or two for Mercury and Venus. The card then takes each point in your chart, the planets and, if you have a birth time, the Ascendant and Midheaven, and each major aspect (conjunction, sextile, square, trine, opposition). An aspect counts when its exact degree lies inside the stretch of the zodiac the retrograde sweeps, because only then does the planet pass it. Inside that stretch it passes three times, and each pass is found to the minute by bisection.