Guides
What is Kundali Milan?
In short
What is Kundali Milan and how many gun are needed for marriage?
Kundali Milan compares two birth charts for compatibility. The most common method, Ashtakoota Gun Milan, scores eight factors out of 36 points in total. A score of 18 or above is conventionally treated as acceptable, but the total matters less than which koota lost the points — Nadi and Bhakoot are weighted heavily and are treated as blocking on their own.
The eight koota and their weights
The eight are Varna (1 point), Vashya (2), Tara (3), Yoni (4), Graha Maitri (5), Gana (6), Bhakoot (7) and Nadi (8). The weights are not arbitrary: they rise roughly in order of how seriously the tradition treats each factor, which is why Nadi alone is worth almost a quarter of the total.
Six of the eight are computed from the two nakshatras or the two moon rashis, so a full matching needs only the birth details that fix those — which is why Gun Milan can be done when a precise birth time is not available for both people.
What a score does and does not tell you
18 out of 36 is the usual threshold, but a 26 with Nadi dosha is treated more cautiously than a 20 without it. Practitioners look at which koota failed rather than at the total alone, and a full reading also considers Manglik status and the seventh house of both charts — none of which Gun Milan covers.
Ashtakoota is one method among several. In parts of South India, Dashakoota with ten factors is used instead. Treat any single number as one input to a decision, not the decision.