Leo Rashifal December 2026 (Simha Rashi): Ketu Leaves Your Sign

Ketu has been sitting on Simha Rashi since 18 May 2025. At 10:34 pm on Saturday 5 December it leaves, having held your sign for 566 days. If you want one sentence about your December, that is it, and it is good news of a kind that takes a while to recognise.

Ketu on the first house from the Moon does not attack. It withdraws. For the last nineteen months it has been quietly loosening your attachment to your own position — to how you are seen, to a role you used to enjoy holding, to the recognition that Leo in particular runs on. Natives under this transit often describe a strange flatness in exactly the area where they used to feel most vivid: the applause stopped landing, the title stopped meaning much, the thing they were known for stopped feeling like theirs. That is what a first-house Ketu does, and on the sign the Sun rules it is felt more sharply than on most.

It ends on the 5th. What returns after that is appetite for your own life, and it returns gradually rather than at 10:34 pm. Expect the second half of December to feel more like you than any stretch since the middle of last year, and expect that to be the most useful thing about the month.

Rahu Moves From Your Seventh House to Your Sixth

The nodes are always opposite, so the same instant on Saturday night moves Rahu out of Aquarius and into Capricorn — out of your seventh house of marriage and partnership, and into your sixth house of competition, debt, service and illness. For Simha Rashi this is the more practically valuable half of the change.

Rahu in the seventh house is one of its least comfortable positions. It enlarges the partner and distorts the reading you get of them, and over 566 days it tends to produce either a relationship that took up far more room than it deserved or an involvement that turned out to be less than it appeared. Anyone who has spent the last nineteen months puzzled by a marriage, a business partner or a person who arrived suddenly and mattered too much has the explanation, and the date it ends.

Where Rahu goes is better. The sixth is one of the upachaya houses — the third, sixth, tenth and eleventh, the houses of growth — in which Rahu is traditionally held to be at its most useful rather than its most disruptive. A sixth-house Rahu is the placement of the person who wins the dispute, outmanoeuvres the competitor and clears the debt, because Rahu’s appetite and cunning are pointed at adversaries instead of at intimates. For the next 567 days, anything competitive tilts your way. The 2026 Rahu-Ketu transit sets out the change for all twelve signs.

Jupiter Turns Retrograde on Your Sign, and Then Leaves It

Jupiter is also in Leo, on your rashi, and has been for months. At 6:09 am on Sunday 13 December it turns retrograde. On the first house that reads as a review of the growth you have made — a plan you had expanded starts contracting slightly, an assumption about your own direction wants revisiting, and confidence that had been building goes back over its own working.

The more important consequence is where the retrograde takes it. Jupiter’s backward motion carries it out of Leo entirely on 25 January 2027, into Cancer, which is its sign of exaltation and your twelfth house. So December is Jupiter’s last full month on your sign for roughly twelve years. Whatever you want Jupiter’s support for in the register of your own person — a course of study, a decision about direction, an act of visible generosity, a commitment — belongs in this month rather than the next. From late January it will be exalted, which is powerful, but it will be working in your house of expenditure and withdrawal rather than on your rashi. Jupiter’s 2026 transit follows the whole path.

There is a footnote worth having. From 18 May 2025 until the 5th of this month, Jupiter has been sharing Leo with Ketu, and a benefic in the same sign as Ketu is a benefic with its warmth turned down. For the last twenty-two days of December, Jupiter is on your sign without Ketu on it for the first time in this transit. It is a small window and it is the best one Jupiter gives you.

Mars Stays on Your Rashi for All Thirty-One Days

Mars is in Leo for the whole of December, which puts a third body on your first house. Leo is ruled by the Sun and Mars counts the Sun as a friend, so Mars here is in congenial territory rather than hostile — but a malefic on the rashi is still a malefic on the rashi, and it has a consistent signature: more physical energy than usual, a shorter fuse than usual, and a tendency to act before the thought has finished.

Paired with Ketu’s departure, this is actually a good combination. Ketu leaving returns your interest in your own life; Mars supplies the drive to do something about it. Simha Rashi should expect the back three weeks of December to feel energetic in a way the year has not. The cost is temper. Mars on the rashi in a Sun-ruled sign makes pride quick to engage, and the specific risk is an argument you win and regret — most likely at work, where the Sun sits in your fourth and then fifth house rather than your tenth, giving you less institutional cover than you think.

Mars on the first house is also a heat and accident transit in the classical reading. Take the ordinary precautions with sharp objects, vehicles and physical exertion, particularly in the week after the 13th when Jupiter’s restraint on the same sign turns retrograde.

Ardha Ashtama Shani Starts Moving Forward on the Eleventh

Saturn is in Pisces, the eighth house from Leo, which is the placement classically called Ardha Ashtama Shani — the half-eighth Saturn, understood to carry roughly half the weight of Sade Sati. Simha Rashi has been under it for some time, and November’s reading covers what the placement does in detail.

December’s development is one dated event: at 5:31 am on Friday 11 December, Saturn turns direct. It has been retrograde since the middle of the year, which in the eighth house means the same obstruction re-encountered — a delay that recurred, a shared-money matter that would not close, an anxiety that kept returning to the same point. Forward motion does not remove an eighth-house Saturn, but it changes it from circular to linear. Things that were stuck begin to move slowly instead of not at all, and for a transit this long that distinction is most of the experience of it.

Practical use: anything in the eighth-house category you gave up pushing during the retrograde — an insurance claim, a loan restructuring, an inheritance matter, a settlement — should be picked up again after the 11th. It will not be quick. It will no longer be circular.

Your Ruler Spends Half the Month in Your Fourth House

The Sun rules Leo, so its position is always the second thing to read after your own sign. It begins December in Scorpio and your fourth house of home, mother, property and inner peace, and moves to Sagittarius and your fifth house of children, romance and creative work at 10:20 am on Wednesday 16 December. Mercury runs slightly ahead of it, entering the fourth at 5:24 pm on the 2nd and the fifth at 7:36 am on the 22nd.

The New Moon of 6:21 am on Wednesday 9 December — at 22.7° of Scorpio in Jyeshtha nakshatra, whose lord Mercury is in the same house — therefore falls in your fourth house with your ruling planet already there. That is a genuinely well-configured lunation for a domestic beginning: move, renovate, resolve something with your mother, or settle a property question. Fourth-house New Moons are the year’s natural place for that, and this one has both the Sun and the nakshatra lord present.

From the 16th the register changes to the fifth house, which suits Leo better than any other. A fifth-house Sun in Sagittarius is good for children, for teaching, for performance and for creative work done with some grandeur. Venus, meanwhile, sits in its own sign in your third house all month — a modest but reliable support for writing, negotiation, short travel and dealings with siblings.

The Full Moon at 6:58 am on Thursday 24 December, at 8° of Gemini in Ardra, falls in your eleventh house of gains, networks and elder siblings. Ardra’s lord is Rahu, which by then sits in your sixth house where it does its best work. An eleventh-house Full Moon is a culmination in the house of income and allies: something asked for through a network arrives, or a gain that has been building becomes concrete. It is the most straightforwardly positive event of your December.

Health: A Month of Returning Energy

The health picture in December is better than it has been, and for a specific reason: Ketu comes off your rashi on the 5th. A first-house Ketu is the transit most associated with vitality that drains without a diagnosis — low appetite, fatigue that no test explains, and a general disengagement from the body. Nineteen months of that is a long time, and its removal is felt.

Mars on the rashi then supplies the opposite: heat, drive and a willingness to overexert. The two together make December the right month to restart something physical that lapsed during Ketu’s stay, and the wrong month to restart it at the intensity you remember. Build back rather than resume. Mars in the first house also inclines towards inflammation, fever and injury from haste, so the caution is about pace rather than about capacity.

Rahu’s move into your sixth house on the 5th is worth one line for health as well as for competition. The sixth is the house of illness, and Rahu there tends to make conditions harder to name than to treat — symptoms that do not fit a pattern. For the next eighteen months, a complaint that has been dismissed once deserves a second look with a different practitioner rather than a third look with the same one.

Key Dates for Leo in December 2026

• 2 December, 5:24 pm: Mercury enters Scorpio and your fourth house, ahead of the Sun. Good for the paperwork side of a property or family matter.
• 5 December, 10:34 pm: Ketu leaves Leo after 566 days on your rashi, and Rahu leaves your seventh house for your sixth. The single most important moment of your year, and both halves of it favour you.
• 9 December, 6:21 am: New Moon at 22.7° Scorpio, Jyeshtha, in your fourth house, with your ruler the Sun and the nakshatra lord Mercury both present. The year’s best date to begin something domestic.
• 11 December, 5:31 am: Saturn turns direct in your eighth house. Ardha Ashtama Shani stops circling. Reopen the settlement, the claim or the loan you gave up on.
• 13 December, 6:09 am: Jupiter turns retrograde on your own sign. Review rather than expand — and note that this begins Jupiter’s exit from Leo on 25 January 2027.
• 16 December, 10:20 am: The Sun enters Sagittarius and your fifth house. Creative work, children and performance come into their best window of the month.
• 22 December, 7:36 am: Mercury joins the Sun in your fifth house. Good for writing, teaching and anything requiring wit in front of an audience.
• 24 December, 6:58 am: Full Moon at 8° Gemini, Ardra, in your eleventh house, with Ardra’s lord Rahu newly placed in your sixth. A gain or a request through a network lands. The best day of the month.
• All month: Mars on your own rashi. Energy and a short fuse in equal measure. Also Venus in its own sign in your third house — reliable support for writing, negotiation and short journeys.
• 6–31 December: Jupiter on your sign without Ketu beside it for the first time in this transit, and the last such window for about twelve years.

Week by Week

1–5 December: The Last Five Days of Ketu

The final stretch of a transit is often its most noticeable, and a first-house Ketu tends to sign off with a last wave of not-caring. Do not make a decision about your direction, your role or your relationship in these five days; you will read all three differently by the middle of the month. Mercury enters your fourth house on the 2nd, so domestic paperwork is the useful work available. Then on Saturday night, nineteen months end.

6–12 December: The Best Week of the Month

Ketu is off your sign, Rahu is out of your marriage house, and the New Moon of Wednesday the 9th falls in your fourth house with your ruling planet in it. On Friday the 11th, Saturn turns direct in your eighth. There is no week in your December better configured than this one. Begin the domestic thing at the New Moon, reopen the stalled financial matter after the 11th, and notice how much more interested in your own life you are than you were a fortnight ago.

13–19 December: Jupiter Turns, the Sun Moves to Your Fifth

Jupiter goes retrograde on your rashi on Sunday the 13th, which invites a review of the plan rather than an addition to it. With Mars on the same sign and Jupiter’s restraint now weakened, this is the week to be careful about temper and about haste — the argument available here is not worth having. On Wednesday the 16th the Sun crosses into your fifth house, which lifts the second half of the month considerably. Creative work started after the 16th has better support than anything started before it.

20–31 December: Gains, and Jupiter’s Last Clear Window

Mercury joins the Sun in your fifth house on the 22nd and the Full Moon of Thursday the 24th falls in your eleventh, which is where income and allies live. Something asked for arrives, or a gain becomes concrete. These are also the last eleven days of Jupiter on your sign without Ketu, and the last full stretch of Jupiter on your sign at all — a commitment, a decision about direction or an act of real generosity is better placed here than in January. Mars remains on your rashi, so the energy is available; the discipline is yours to supply.

Remedies for Simha Rashi in December 2026

This is a month in which the ordinary logic of remedies is inverted. Two difficult transits are ending rather than beginning, so the work is less about protection and more about not wasting the opening. The Sun comes first, because it rules your sign and because nineteen months of Ketu have left it under-fed.

• Surya Arghya on the four Sundays — 6, 13, 20 and 27 December: water offered to the rising Sun, facing east. Your ruling planet has been dimmed by nineteen months of Ketu on its own sign, and the observance suits Simha Rashi more than any other. See our Sun page. Note that the 13th is also the morning Jupiter turns retrograde on your sign.
• Ketu observance on 5 December, and then stop: a farewell rather than a plea. Feed stray dogs and give away a blanket on the day it leaves your rashi. Our Ketu remedies page has the forms, and the joint Rahu-Ketu remedies matter because both nodes shift in the same instant.
• Do the thing you stopped wanting: the specific counter to a departing first-house Ketu. There is something you used to care about and quietly abandoned in the last year and a half. Restart one of them in December, deliberately, before the appetite has fully returned.
• Hanuman Chalisa on all five Tuesdays — 1, 8, 15, 22 and 29 December: Mars sits on your own rashi for all thirty-one days, which is the classical case for it, and it also serves the retrograde-turned-direct Saturn in your eighth house.
• Guru worship on Thursdays — 3, 10, 17, 24 and 31 December: Jupiter is on your sign for its last full month in about twelve years and turns retrograde on the 13th. Chana dal, turmeric, yellow cloth, and respect shown to a teacher. Our Jupiter remedies page has the rest.
• Shani observance on Saturdays — 5, 12, 19 and 26 December: Ardha Ashtama Shani turns direct on the 11th. A lamp under a peepal tree at dusk, with sesame oil, black til and iron. Our Shani remedies page has the detail.
• Begin the domestic thing at the New Moon of the 9th: a fourth-house New Moon with your ruling planet and the nakshatra lord both in the house is the best start-date the year gives Simha Rashi for anything to do with home, property or mother.
• Concede one argument before the 20th: Mars on the rashi with a retrograde Jupiter beside it from the 13th makes pride unusually cheap to engage. Choosing to lose one exchange is the practical remedy, and it costs less than the alternative.

In Summary

December 2026 is a month of releases for Simha Rashi. At 10:34 pm on Saturday the 5th, Ketu leaves your own rashi after 566 days and Rahu leaves your seventh house of marriage — and Rahu lands in your sixth, one of the three houses where it is traditionally most useful, which means the next eighteen months tilt competitive situations in your favour. After nineteen months in which your interest in your own life has been quietly draining away, this is the turn.

Two more dated improvements follow. Saturn turns direct in your eighth house at 5:31 am on Friday the 11th, so Ardha Ashtama Shani stops circling and starts moving — pick up the claim or the settlement you abandoned. And the Sun, your ruler, crosses into your fifth house at 10:20 am on Wednesday the 16th, which is the best half of the month for creative work, children and performance.

The one thing not to waste is Jupiter. It turns retrograde on your sign on the 13th and leaves Leo entirely on 25 January 2027, which makes December its last full month on your rashi for roughly twelve years — and from the 6th onwards, the first time in this transit that it sits there without Ketu. A commitment, a course, a decision about your direction: this month rather than next.

How completely Ketu’s departure is felt depends on your natal Moon’s exact degree and on which of the sign’s nine Leo padas holds it — a Moon in the early degrees was released from Ketu’s contact months ago, while a Moon in the last pada has been under it until now. What the Leo rashi fixes and what it leaves open handles the pada layer, and the November reading describes how the month arrived here.