Personal planet
Venus in astrology
Venus is usually introduced as the planet of love, which is true and too narrow. It governs what you value, which decides what you are drawn to, how you relate once drawn, and what you are prepared to pay for. Money and taste sit here for the same reason attraction does.
Venus at a glance
| Rules | Taurus and Libra |
|---|---|
| Exaltation | Pisces |
| Detriment | Aries and Scorpio |
| Fall | Virgo |
| Orbital cycle | About 225 days |
| Time in a sign | 23 to 60 days |
| Retrograde | Every 18 months, about 40 days |
| Governs | Love, beauty, values, money, art, pleasure, relating |
Fast enough to be genuinely yours. Mercury, Venus and Mars change sign in weeks, so two people born a month apart can differ.
What Venus means in a birth chart
Venus describes the standard by which you decide something is worth having. That covers people, and it also covers objects, work, rooms and how you spend. A chart where Venus is prominent is not necessarily romantic; it is one where taste and value do a lot of the deciding.
In relationships, Venus describes your side of the exchange: what you offer, what you find appealing, and how you behave once you have someone. It is not a compatibility score, and reading two Venus signs against each other is the least reliable use anyone puts it to.
Venus by sign and house
The sign describes the style. Venus in earth signs values what is solid, useful and enduring, and is generally unimpressed by charm on its own. In air it values conversation and finds rapport before it finds attraction. In fire it wants heat and directness. In water it wants depth and tends to attach quickly and quietly.
The house says where the value gets spent: the 2nd on possessions and self-worth, the 7th on partnership, the 10th on reputation and the work you want to be seen doing.
Strength and difficulty
Venus rules Taurus and Libra, the two signs organised around pleasure and around fairness. It is exalted in Pisces, where the tradition says love is least conditional and most easily given away.
It is in detriment in Aries and Scorpio and in fall in Virgo. Those are not unloving placements. Aries wants rather than relates, Scorpio will not settle for the pleasant surface Venus is comfortable with, and Virgo applies a standard to something that does not respond well to being assessed. Each describes a specific friction rather than an absence.
Venus retrograde
Venus turns retrograde roughly every eighteen months for about forty days, less often than Mercury and taken more seriously. The tradition reads it as a period for reviewing what you value rather than acting on it, and it has a long association with people from the past reappearing.
In a birth chart it is read as a relationship to value that had to be worked out rather than inherited, often including a stretch of not knowing what you wanted.
Venus in astrocartography
A birth chart says where Venus sits. An astrocartography map says where on Earth it was strongest at the moment you were born. Venus draws four lines across the world, one for each angle, and they do not mean the same thing as each other.
Frequently asked questions
- What does my Venus sign say about relationships?
- It describes your side of one: what you find attractive, what you offer, and what you consider worth keeping. It says nothing about who you are compatible with, which needs both whole charts rather than two placements.
- Why is Venus about money as well as love?
- Because both come down to value. Venus governs the judgement that something is worth having, and that judgement applies to a person, a painting or a price in the same way.
- Can Venus be far from my Sun sign?
- Only two signs either side. Venus never appears more than 48 degrees from the Sun, so there are five possible Venus signs for any Sun sign.
Where is your Venus?
None of this describes you until you know which sign and house your Venus actually occupies. The chart is free, and it is calculated from the Swiss Ephemeris rather than from a template.