Reading: today (transit) · valid while the transit lasts, not for life
Some weeks a stranger smiles at you on the bus, a coworker notices your new haircut, and you find yourself stopping in front of a shop window for no reason at all. You want a good meal, a shirt in a color you never wear, an evening where nobody talks about work. When those cravings show up all at once, the sky often has a simple explanation: Venus is crossing the Sun you were born with, or forming an angle to it.
What happens between transiting Venus and your natal Sun
Your natal Sun is the center of your chart. It describes what drives you, how you assert who you are and where you feel you belong. The page on the Sun in astrology covers it in full.
Venus is about what you love and what you value: your tastes, your attractions, pleasure, tenderness, the beauty of things, and money too. In astrology it mostly describes the pull of attraction, what draws you to others and what draws others to you. You’ll find the full portrait on the Venus page.
When Venus in the sky forms an exact angle to your natal Sun, astrologers call it a transit. Your birth chart stays put; for a few days it simply gets a visit from a moving planet. What gets touched here is the way you see yourself and the image you give off. Venus makes your will a little more likable: you want people to like you, and you want to treat yourself. The reverse movement, the Sun in the sky crossing your natal Venus, has its own page: transiting Sun to natal Venus.
The style depends on your Sun sign. A Taurus Sun savors it: a good meal, a soft fabric, a nap in the sunshine. A Libra or Gemini Sun lives it through people and conversation. A Capricorn Sun keeps a cool head and treats itself by choosing well, sometimes something it will keep for ten years.
This transit predicts no event. It colors a few days, and that color blends with everything else in your sky right now.
How long the transit lasts
Venus moves about one degree a day, a bit more when it speeds up. An aspect to your natal Sun is usually felt for two to three days, sometimes four, peaking on the day the angle is exact.
Venus never strays more than about 47 degrees from the Sun in the sky. Outside the years when it goes retrograde, it travels around the zodiac in roughly a year. So each year your Sun generally gets one conjunction from Venus, one opposition, and two each of the sextile, square and trine. The conjunction always falls within a few weeks of your birthday, because the Sun in the sky is never far from where it was when you were born. The opposition comes about six months later.
One exception, retrograde motion, can repeat the same aspect three times; more on that below.
The conjunction: people notice you more
Venus crosses your natal Sun. For a few days, who you are and what you love point the same way, and it shows on your face.
People find it easier to come up and talk to you. A compliment arrives without your fishing for it, a date goes smoothly, and you finally like a photo of yourself. You also feel like taking care of yourself, whether that means a haircut, a piece of clothing that feels like you, or an evening spent doing nothing useful. Anything that calls for a good first impression has the wind at its back, from a job interview to a first meeting.
Take Emma, who sells her pottery at a weekend makers’ market. During those days she rearranges her table in ten minutes, people stop to look, and she sells more in one Saturday than in the whole previous month. On Monday she realizes the paperwork she’s been avoiding for three weeks is still sitting there.
The downside fits in one word: ease. When everything feels pleasant, anything that takes effort feels even heavier, and you can put it off without noticing. The conjunction can also nudge your spending up, because everything pretty seems well deserved.
How to use it: schedule whatever goes better with a bit of charm, a meeting, a request, a project you want to show. Keep one hour for the thankless task of the moment; your good mood will make it lighter.
The sextile: a small step toward other people
Twice a year, Venus forms a sextile, a 60-degree angle, to your natal Sun. The mood is friendly, as long as you make the first move.
A note to thank the neighbor who fed your cat, a lunch invitation to someone you barely know, a yes to a night out you’d normally turn down out of habit: these ordinary gestures get a warm response. Creative work moves along well. It’s also a good time to move a piece of furniture, pick a paint color or make the purchase you’ve been mulling over for a month.
The sextile has one quirk: it forces nothing. Opportunities pass within reach, and they move on if nobody grabs them.
How to use it: pick one person and take a step toward them. A small gesture is enough, as long as you actually make it.
The square: pleasure versus the plan
Twice a year, Venus forms a square, a 90-degree angle, to your natal Sun. What you feel like doing and what you’d planned to do pull in two directions.
A friend suggests dinner on the night you meant to finish a project. A coat catches your eye right after you promised yourself to stick to your budget. Someone charming makes you want to drop everything. You may also look for other people’s approval more than usual, then get annoyed with yourself for caring so much about a heart under a photo.
Marcus decided to get back into running three times a week. During the square, every morning offers a reason to stay in bed, and on Saturday a brunch with friends replaces the run. He keeps two runs out of three and enjoys the brunch without guilt. The next week he’s back on track, and he now knows how much those mornings with his friends mean to him.
The friction is mild and it passes fast. It shows you how much room you give pleasure in your week, and whether that amount suits you.
How to use it: before a purchase or a night out, ask yourself whether you’re doing it for you or for the image. Let big purchases sit for three days. And pick one pleasure that does you good over ten that fill a gap.
✦ Spot the days when Venus softens your year — the Astrological year · $19.99 USD
The trine: everything goes gracefully
Twice a year, Venus forms a trine, a 120-degree angle, to your natal Sun. What you like and what you want line up without effort.
For a few days, relationships flow. People listen to you gladly, a disagreement gets settled over coffee, an invitation shows up at the right time. Your taste is spot on: you find the right gift, the right outfit, the layout that makes your project look good. Use it to show a creative piece, redo the corner of the living room that has bugged you since winter, or give yourself a pleasant afternoon without wondering whether you earned it.
The Venus trine stays light. It makes the days gentler without solving a serious problem on its own. And it makes no noise: if you don’t ask anything of it, it slips by without a trace.
How to use it: save for these days anything that needs goodwill on the other side, a reconciliation, a favor to ask, a pitch to someone whose opinion matters.
The opposition: other people take center stage
Once a year, about six months after your birthday, Venus stands opposite your natal Sun. Your attention shifts from yourself to your relationships.
Your partner needs you, a friend surprises you, a client is hoping for a gesture. People give you a lot during these days, and they expect something back. You can end up torn between what you want and the urge to please, to the point of agreeing to a weekend with people you hardly know when you were dreaming of quiet.
Nina and her boyfriend have to choose where to go on vacation. He wants the mountains, she’s dreaming of the beach. During the opposition she’s tempted to give in just to avoid the conversation. In the end she suggests a week of each, and she likes the plan because she helped build it.
These days suit friendly negotiations, making up, and plans for two. The one condition is keeping your own voice in the deal. An arrangement where you said what you wanted holds up; one you accepted through gritted teeth ends up weighing on you. For anything to do with partnership, the page on the 7th house in astrology rounds out this transit.
How to use it: listen to what the other person expects, then say what you expect.
What if Venus goes retrograde during this transit?
Every eighteen to nineteen months, Venus appears to move backward through the zodiac for about forty days. It’s a trick of perspective: Venus passes between Earth and the Sun, and from here it looks like it’s reversing. The page on Venus retrograde explains how it works.
The backward loop always happens when Venus is close to the Sun in the sky. If your natal Sun sits in the stretch of the zodiac where the loop happens, your birthday falls during those weeks or close to them, and the conjunction forms three times. First comes an initial contact, when Venus moves forward over your Sun; then a return pass, when it crosses the same degree going backward; and finally a last pass, once it has resumed its normal direction. The whole thing can spread over anywhere from a few weeks to about three months. If Venus stops right near your Sun (astrologers say it “stations”), the aspect stays active for ten days or so, sometimes longer. The same loop can also repeat a square or a trine when it happens on a degree in aspect to your Sun.
In practice, the topic comes back around. A relationship you thought was settled reopens, an old love of drawing or music resurfaces, a purchase you were thrilled with leaves you cold two weeks later. The period isn’t great for drastic changes to your look, like a tattoo or a very short haircut, and it’s very good for taking stock.
How to use it: on the first contact, note what attracts you without committing. During the return pass, review your tastes, your budget and your relationships, and pick up the conversation you left hanging. On the last pass, wrap it up: buy what survived the second thoughts, confirm what holds.
Frequently asked questions
Does transiting Venus conjunct my natal Sun happen around my birthday?
Within the weeks around it, yes. Venus never strays more than about 47 degrees from the Sun in the sky, so its conjunction with your natal Sun falls no more than about six weeks before or after your birthday. Some years Venus sits on your Sun on the day itself, and then it appears next to the Sun in the sky of the year that’s starting for you. For the Sun’s own return, read transiting Sun to natal Sun.
Is Venus conjunct my Sun a good time to meet someone?
It’s a pleasant time to get to know people, because you feel good in your own skin and it shows. It doesn’t guarantee a meeting. And a story that begins under this transit will need more than a few days of charm to last. If love is on your mind, also look at Venus transiting the 5th house and Venus transiting the 7th house.
Venus square my natal Sun: should I avoid spending money?
Nothing rules it out. The square pushes toward mood purchases, the ones you make to cheer yourself up or to be seen. A planned, budgeted purchase is fine; for the rest, if the urge is still there three days later, it was serious. To follow Venus across the rest of your chart, read about its transits to your natal Moon and your natal Mercury.
✦ Read the sky of the year that’s starting for you — the Astrological year · $19.99 USD
