Getting Started with AstroWatch

AstroWatch is a fast, precise, fully local astrology desktop app for Windows 11 — Swiss Ephemeris accuracy, a live Western + Vedic toolkit, and no account or cloud sync required. This guide gets you from a fresh install to reading your first natal chart.

The Dashboard — your home screen once a chart is loaded.

Install AstroWatch

AstroWatch is distributed exclusively through the Microsoft Store, which handles installs, updates and (for Pro) purchase and licensing automatically.

Requires Windows 11. There's nothing else to configure — no separate ephemeris files, no runtime to install, no account to create.

First launch — local, no account needed

The first time you open AstroWatch, it prepares its local database — reference data, calculation engines and the built-in interpretation library are seeded on your machine in the background, shown behind a brief splash screen. This only happens once.

Free vs. Pro, in one paragraph

Every step in this guide works on the Free tier: natal, transit and Solar Return charts, live aspects, the Sun/Moon dashboard, Placidus and Whole Sign houses, the Western wheel style, and up to two configurable chart layers. Pro (one-time purchase) unlocks the rest of the Vedic suite — North/South/East Indian chart styles, nakshatras, daśā, divisional charts, the Aspect Calendar, Graphic Ephemeris, full Moon Movements, declinations, synastry, all 21 chart themes and print-ready written reports. Menu items you haven't unlocked are greyed out with a small PRO tag rather than hidden, so you always know what's there. See the full Free vs. Pro comparison.

Set your default location

Before anything else, point AstroWatch at where you are. Open the location control on the right side of the top toolbar — it shows a city name and a small pin icon — and set your default transit location. This is what the live Sun/Moon dashboard and the current-sky chart use, so it's worth getting right on day one.

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1. 1Menu bar — Profiles, View, Tools, Settings and Help.
2. 2Natal / Transit tabs — Transit shows the live sky; Natal is where your saved charts open.
3. 3Default location — click to change the city the live chart and Sun/Moon panel use.
4. 4Live transit chart — the wheel, angles and aspect lines for the current moment.
5. 5Sun & Moon panel — daylight window, moon phase and the lunation cycle at a glance.
6. 6Timeline — unit selector, step arrows and the Now button.

Get comfortable with the timeline

The Timeline strip below the chart is how you move through time without leaving the dashboard:

1. Pick a unit

   The unit button (it shows the current step, e.g. Day) opens a list — Second, Minute, Hour, Day, Week, Month or Year — that sets how far each step moves the chart.

2. Step back and forward

   The two round arrow buttons flanking the timeline track move the loaded chart backward or forward by your chosen unit. Click repeatedly (or hold) to animate the sky.

3. Reset to now

   The Now button on the right snaps you back to the present moment and shows how far you've travelled (e.g. Now · ±3) while you're away from it.

Create your first birth profile

A profile is a saved birth record that AstroWatch can turn into a chart at any time. Open it from the menu bar: Profiles → New Profile — the dialog is titled Add birth data.

1. Name and category

   Full name, then tag who the chart is for — Self, Family or Client.

2. Date and time of birth

   Day / Month / Year, then Hour / Minute with a local AM/PM toggle.

3. Country and city

   Pick both from the dropdowns; AstroWatch resolves the exact coordinates and time zone underneath and marks the location RESOLVED.

4. Time accuracy and profile type

   Time accuracy (Rodden Rating) records how reliable the birth time is — e.g. AA — Birth certificate / official record — and Profile category sets the chart type (Natal by default).

5. Save

   Save profile commits it to your local database. The Advanced & Notes and Life Events tabs at the top of the dialog hold extra detail you can fill in later.

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1. 1Name & category — who this chart is for (Self / Family / Client).
2. 2Date of birth — Day, Month, Year.
3. 3Time of birth — Hour, Minute, with a local AM/PM toggle.
4. 4Country & city — pick both from the dropdowns.
5. 5Resolved location — exact coordinates and time zone, filled in automatically.
6. 6Save profile — commits it to your local database.

Load and read your natal chart

AstroWatch opens on the Transit tab, showing the live sky for your default location. Your saved profiles live one tab over:

1. Switch to the Natal tab

   Click Natal in the tab pill at the top centre of the window.

2. Pick your profile

   Choose it from Profiles → Recent Profiles, or Profiles → Open Database if it's not in the recent list yet. The wheel, planetary positions, aspects and Sun/Moon panel redraw immediately.

3. Toggle Info

   The Info button shows or hides the panels around the wheel — Ascendant, Midheaven and the other chart-detail readouts.

4. Try a Bi-wheel

   Bi-wheel overlays a second ring — current transits around the natal chart — so you can read "what's happening for me right now" at a glance.

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1. 1Loaded profile — the name and chart type of whoever's open.
2. 2Natal tab active — Transit is one click back to the live sky.
3. 3Bi-wheel — overlay a second ring (e.g. current transits) around the natal wheel.
4. 4Info — show or hide the Ascendant/Midheaven detail panels.
5. 5Expand — open the full Expanded Chart View.

Open the Expanded Chart View

The small full-screen icon at the right end of the chart toolbar (tooltip: Open chart screen) opens the Expanded Chart View — a larger wheel, an Aspect Grid, and Single / Bi / Tri / Quad-Wheel layouts with Configure Wheels to choose what each ring shows. It's worth a look even before you need those deeper tools, just to see the fuller workspace.

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1. 1Back to Dashboard.
2. 2Wheel layout — Single, Bi, Tri or Quad-Wheel.
3. 3Configure Wheels — assign what each ring shows, then Export.
4. 4The chart wheel, larger and with more room to read.
5. 5Aspect Grid — every planet-to-planet aspect at a glance, plus a Tight Aspects shortlist.

Keep exploring: the on-screen guide

Everything above also exists as an interactive, point-at-the-control walkthrough right inside the app — the same one that greets you automatically the very first time you open AstroWatch. You can replay it whenever you like from Help → On-screen Guide. This page (Help → Getting Started Guide) always reopens here, so the two live side by side: read at your own pace, or let the app point things out for you directly on screen.

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1. 1Getting Started Guide — opens this page in your default browser.
2. 2On-screen Guide — replays the interactive walkthrough right here in the app.

What to explore next

That's the core loop — set a location, save a profile, read a chart. From here:

• Settings → Calculation — zodiac (tropical/sidereal), ayanamsha, house system and node type, if you want to match a specific tradition.
• Tools → Aspect Calendar and Graphic Ephemeris — timing engines for tracking exact hits over a date range (Pro).
• View → Nakshatras, Vimshottari Daśā, Day Timings / Horā and the Divisional Chart submenu — the Vedic toolkit (Pro).
• Profiles → Export Profile Report — a quick natal PDF for the open profile, free on every tier (watermarked and page-capped; Pro removes both).

The sections in the sidebar for each of these are on the way — this page will link straight to them as they ship.