Vastu for Home: A Room-by-Room Checklist

By VastuEasy · Updated 27 September 2026 · 9 min read

Vastu Shastra reads a home by direction: which part of the house each room sits in, measured from true north. This checklist goes through the rooms that matter most — entrance, kitchen, puja room, bedroom, toilets, study and staircase — and gives, for each, the directions traditionally considered best, acceptable, and best avoided.

1. Start with true north

Every rule below depends on knowing where north really is. The most common mistake is to assume the top of the drawing is north — architects orient plans to fit the page, not the compass.

• Take a compass reading. Stand at the centre of the home, or just outside the main door, away from steel doors, appliances and parked vehicles, which pull the needle. A phone compass works if you calibrate it first.
• Mark north on the plan. Draw the north line on your floor plan at the angle you measured.
• Divide the plan into sixteen zones. Vastu splits the full circle into sixteen directions of 22.5° each: the four cardinal directions (N, E, S, W), the four corners (NE, SE, SW, NW), and the eight in between — NNE, ENE, ESE, SSE, SSW, WSW, WNW and NNW. The zones radiate from the centre of the plan, so a room belongs to whichever zone most of it falls in.

A few degrees of error can move a room from one zone into the next — which is why the rest of this checklist is only as good as your north line.

2. Main entrance

The classical texts are more precise about the entrance than about any other part of the house. Each of the four outer walls is divided into eight equal parts, or padas — 32 in all, numbered N1–N8, E1–E8, S1–S8 and W1–W8, running clockwise — and each pada carries its own verdict. What matters is which pada the door falls in, not simply which way the house faces.

The padas classically rated most auspicious are:

• North wall: N3, N4 and N5 — associated with career growth, wealth and calm. N8 is moderately positive.
• East wall: E3 and E4 — vitality, career expansion and influential connections.
• South wall: S3 and S4 — prosperity, fame and financial stability.
• West wall: W3 and W4 — financial growth and business success. W5 is moderately positive.

Notice that the south and west walls each have highly auspicious padas. A south-facing entrance is not automatically bad — a door in S3 or S4 is classically one of the better positions in the house. Equally, an east-facing door is not automatically good: E8, at the south-east end of the east wall, is one of the five padas rated highly inauspicious, along with S5, S8, W1 and W6.

3. Kitchen

The kitchen is the home's fire, so it belongs in the fire zone.

Best SE
Acceptable ESE, SSE, E, S, NW, W, WNW
Avoid NE, N, NNE, ENE, SW

South-east is accepted across classical, traditional and modern Vastu alike. ESE and SSE stay inside the same fire belt, and east is a long-standing second choice — morning light, and cooking while facing east, are traditional recommendations. North-east is universally regarded as the worst place for a kitchen: fire in the zone of water and clarity. The south-west is avoided because fire there is said to "burn" the earth element that zone depends on.

If your kitchen is in the north-west — one of the accepted alternatives — keep the stove in the south-east part of the room.

4. Puja room

The puja or prayer room belongs to the space element and to the zone the morning light first reaches.

Best NE
Acceptable N, E, NNE, ENE, W
Avoid S, SW, SE, SSE, ESE, SSW

The south and south-west sit far from what tradition treats as the entry point of prana, the life force, so worship there is said to carry less benefit. The south-east is avoided for a different reason: it is the fire zone, and fire clashing with a room meant for stillness is linked with restlessness during prayer.

5. Bedroom

The bedroom is a room for rest and stability, which Vastu ties to the earth element.

Best SW — especially for the master bedroom
Acceptable N, E, S, W, SSE, SSW, WSW, NW
Avoid NE, SE

The bedroom is one of the more flexible rooms. The two zones to avoid are the north-east, which should be kept light and uncluttered rather than weighed down with beds and wardrobes, and the south-east, where the fire element under a resting room is linked with restless sleep and irritability. If your bedroom is in the south-east, avoid sleeping with your head towards the south-east.

6. Toilets and bathrooms

Toilets are about disposal, so they belong in the zones associated with letting go — and away from the corners that hold the home's key energies.

Best SSW, WNW, ESE
Acceptable W
Avoid NE, SW, SE, NW, NNE, ENE

All four corners are on the avoid list. A toilet in the north-east is the most commonly cited dosha, linked with anxiety and delays; in the south-west it is linked with career and relationship instability; in the south-east with blocked cash flow and fatigue; and in the north-west with indecision and lost support.

7. Study

A study needs focus and clarity, which Vastu associates with the light-filled north and east.

Best NE, N, E, WSW
Acceptable NNE, ENE, ESE, W
Avoid SW, S

WSW is the one western zone traditionally tied to education and learning, which is why it sits alongside the north-east. If your study must be in the south or south-west, place the desk in the north-east corner of the room and sit facing east or north.

8. Staircase, water tank and the centre

Staircase

Best S, SSW, SW, WSW, W
Acceptable SE, NW
Avoid NE, N, NNE

A staircase is heavy, so it belongs in the south and west, which Vastu wants weighted. In the north-east it is said to weigh down the most sacred part of the plot.

Underground water tank or sump

Best N, NE
Acceptable E
Avoid SW, S, the centre

Water below ground belongs in the water zones of the north and north-east. An overhead tank is treated differently in most traditions and isn't covered here.

The centre (Brahmasthan)

The centre of the home, the Brahmasthan, is meant to stay open and light. Keep a toilet, septic tank, kitchen or staircase out of it, and avoid pillars, beams, heavy furniture or an underground tank or pit at the centre.

9. The checklist at a glance

Zones not listed for a room are neutral: neither recommended nor a problem.

10. When you can't move a room

Few homes pass every check, and nobody should demolish a kitchen over a checklist. Vastu practice separates corrections into two kinds:

• Structural — relocating a room, a toilet or a septic tank. Worth considering at the design stage or during a renovation you were already planning. A septic tank in the north-east is one of the few cases where practitioners treat relocation as the real fix rather than something a remedy can substitute for.
• Non-structural — corrections placed without construction: metal strips or coloured tape at a threshold, a change of colour, moving the stove or the desk within the room, or keeping a zone clear of clutter. For an entrance in an unfavourable pada, for example, the traditional correction is a metal strip or coloured tape set into the threshold, chosen by which wall the door is on.

The sensible order is to fix what's cheap first, then plan structural changes for when you're renovating anyway. And if you're about to buy or build, check the plan before you commit — that's when every fix is still free.