Welcome to the most intense month of 2024. Your April 2024 horoscope is serving up eclipses, a Mercury Retrograde, a Mars-Saturn wall slam, and a Jupiter-Uranus great awakening. The ground is moving, the earth is shaking, and hopefully that’s just a metaphor, because this is definitely the kind of month where the truth can set you free—or is it just that arriving to a dead end makes everything possible again?
No, this isn’t the easiest month for travel, but if you have the flexibility to choose, the end of the month looks a lot better than the beginning. Mercury is trolling us all by stationing retrograde on April Fool’s Day, and the solar eclipse in Aries comes in hot on the 8th, followed closely by the Mars-Saturn conjunction on the 10th. The first week or so of the month is by far the most disruptive and problem-focused. Pack your literal and metaphorical first aid kit in your luggage, because you’ll be glad you had that extra charger when push comes to shove, and you’ll thank yourself later for having a backup route to your destination.
Just remember: when one door closes, another one opens. The Jupiter-Uranus conjunction on the 20th is a once-in-every-14-years phenomenon, and it is the kind that shifts paradigms, opens new vistas, materializes new opportunities, and effects profound inner movement and liberation. Coming so closely on the heels of early April’s crisis, it seems likely that wherever this is taking you, you couldn’t have gotten to the excellent view without taking the road pockmarked with potholes. This comes just in time for Taurus Season to begin, an annual high season for music festivals, gallery hopping, park sitting, good eating, and fine wining. To top it all off, Mercury stations direct on the 25th. Around this time in the month is when you can expect things to start to cohere again, or at least start to feel less chaotic.
Life will be coming at a lot of us fast this April. If you happen to be traveling, it’s not unlikely that the road will be a bumpy and a meaningful one—the kind of trip that adjusts and firmly redirects you. May the opening be worth the strife it took to get there.
Astrologer's note: Below we refer to your signs as “rising” signs, also known as your ascendant sign. Horoscopes are more accurate when read this way—using your birth time and location, you can quickly find your rising sign online (it takes less than 30 seconds).
Aries Rising
It’s time to wake up, shake up, and make yourself available to the changing circumstances that are putting you more firmly on your path. April’s Aries eclipse is about to jump start your cables in a harsh way, but if that’s the kind of force required for a jailbreak, then you probably haven’t been imagining it—you really have been in a deep, serious rut.
Consider the possibility that in order to move through this gauntlet, you’re going to have to inflict some temporary pain on yourself. The eclipse on the 8th is accompanied by a Mars-Saturn conjunction on the 10th, which hits you in a place where you’ve already been feeling particularly vulnerable. Is it that you didn’t see this coming, or have you been doing this to yourself all along?
Don’t be too hard on yourself, because right now is as good a time as any to rewrite your own narrative. April’s Mercury Retrograde in Aries (which starts on the 1st and wraps up on the 25th) collaborates with Venus, and you might be on a roll with the slam poetry of your self-expression—mixing and remixing samples, and perhaps rehashing old stories with a significant other, in your efforts to redefine yourself.
There might be a pretty decent consolation prize coming your way in the form of new financial opportunities. At the very least, you might finally be ready to free yourself from limiting beliefs about your earning potential (and maybe, by extension, the kinds of trips you can afford). As the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction perfects on the 20th, you might be struck by the lightning of a brilliant entrepreneurial idea or a solution to your money woes that frees you from (at least some of) the conditions of your stuck-ness.
Taurus Rising
Haters may come, and friends may go, but at the end of the day, you’ll still have yourself. Not only that, but you’ll probably manage to land on your feet in better shape than before.
April is a month of reckoning, and a lot of that won’t be fun to go through. The Aries solar eclipse on the 8th, which comes part and parcel with a Mars-Saturn conjunction on the 10th, might feel like an acceleration on your way out the door of a friend group or community that doesn’t really have your back when all is said, done, and accounted for. The rejection may sting, but if you’re being real with yourself, you’ve been feeling the call to embrace the lonelier path of your own personal sovereignty for at least a year now. At this point, you might be feeling like it’s now or never, but maybe you needed the universe to force your hand in order to get you to abandon the comfort of stasis.
If you’re on a group trip this month, don’t be afraid to peel away to pursue your own adventure. That can be as literal or metaphorical as you want to make it. And pretty quickly on the other side of this dark night, the sun rises again for you—literally, with the Sun’s ingress into Taurus on the 19th, and a brilliant conjunction between Jupiter and Uranus in your rising sign on the 20th. This is the dawning of the age of You, and your brainchild is about to be born. Either that, or you’re breaking free from chains that have kept you bound for far too long. Could it be a little bit of both? You’re having a stroke of genius that might involve community, your ability to access more funds or resources, and how all of that is aiding your own personal growth.
Gemini Rising
Something’s brewing in the collective, and your role in the spaces you occupy is quickly becoming a flashpoint. Whether the April 8 eclipse dumps the burden of leadership onto your shoulders or a public reckoning of some kind, your ability to represent the group (or demonstrate accountability around the things you represent) is fast-tracking you to new levels of responsibility.
In general, this month is going to involve some backtracking, some second-guessing, and likely some pivoting in regards to a specific friend group or community you belong to. Mercury’s retrograde through Aries (from the 1st through the 25th) will find you revisiting some online discourse, renegotiating your commitments to the group, and linking up with old travel acquaintances you haven’t seen since that one trip to Laos. Somewhere in that process, your status or level of participation in the community will change, and seemingly overnight. Is it that you’re ready to hang up your hat as den mother to your college friends, or is your online following taking you to task for something you said? Generally speaking, these are stressful skies, and a lot will be moving quickly. If you find yourself desperate for an opportunity to get your message across cleanly—or just tap into a clear read on the situation—the Mercury-Sun conjunction on the 11th could provide a dose of clarity.
As if this weren’t enough, there are other, bigger processes crystallizing in April. A lot of this surface-level drama is contributing to profound internal shifts that have been percolating for some months now, and ultimately, preparing you to spread your wings in captivity. Even if you’re under a lot of pressure right now, you’ve been learning so much about yourself, what makes you tick, and what leads you to self-sabotage. The Jupiter-Uranus conjunction on the 20th provides you with rapid breakthroughs, consciousness shifts, and possibilities to free yourself from the conditions and mental patterns that keep you stagnant. Where will you go with this new understanding?
Cancer Rising
Your professional life takes a quantum leap forward this month as the Aries eclipse sparks your tenth house on the 8th. But it’s not all public awards ceremonies and applause—at least some of what’s coming up to be dealt with is existential in nature, or at least deeply implicated in your principles and beliefs. Coming up against a red line of yours, a moral boundary that you simply will not cross, might be part of the equation here. What needs to happen in order for you to rise to the occasion? Accepting new levels of responsibility, either at work or in the world at large, is simply what needs to happen when you’ve reached the dead end of your own disillusionment with the status quo.
You might also be coming up against some roadblocks in April, both of the literal and the spiritual variety. The Mars-Saturn conjunction on the 10th lands in your ninth house, putting the kibosh on some long-distance moves, crumpling up the dissertation you’ve been working on, or blocking your connection with spirit. There are strings attached to accepting that promotion, like maybe sacrificing your flexibility to travel or work remotely. There are natural consequences to the doubts you’re facing on your spiritual or educational path, like answering the call to become more fearless. You might not feel like you have much of a choice, but hopefully this lets you be recognized for the badass that you are.
Even better is that once you’re elevated, the whole team gets to eat well (and brainstorm something inspired together). The Jupiter-Uranus conjunction on the 20th is bringing you to a climax around the collective visions, team efforts, and thought leadership summits you’ve been a part of, and the Big Idea—the one you’ve been circling around for months—is pretty much a lightning strike of inspiration away. Enjoy the feeling of collective liftoff, because all of your preliminary effort is finally paying off.
Leo Rising
You might feel as though you’re going from 0 to 100 on the runway of your worldly ambitions this month, but don’t expect to make a direct beeline from departures to arrivals—this is going to be one of the more circuitous routes you’ve had to fly in awhile. Mercury’s retrograde from April 1-25, plus the solar eclipse on the 8th, are all landing in your ninth house of travel, education, and spirituality. You’re definitely being catapulted forward in your experiential quest for meaning and greater knowledge of the world, even if you experience some turbulence and redirection along the way.
If there’s a reason for the jarring transition, it may have something to do with your finances, a shared venture or collaboration, or with a grieving process. On April 10th, the Mars-Saturn conjunction steers you into a renewed sense of loss, a “do not pass go, do not collect $200.” The roadblock in this area is the impetus for the hard launch we’ve been talking about. It might be that student debt forces your hand to move in a new direction with your education, or that losing something (or someone) important spurs you to make a long-distance move, to eat-pray-love your way through the healing process. Perhaps the end of something is the beginning of a new pursuit of divinity. Just know that you’re probably going to be changing your mind about what that might actually look like, and that this confirmation that all is going according to plan.
In the meantime, the Big Brilliant Idea you’ve been gestating is just about ripe for picking. Around the 20th, the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction represents the apotheosis of your body of work, a culmination of your vocational path that is at once the natural next step of where you’ve been going and also a quantum leap forward. For whatever reason, the heaviness of this moment also creates the conditions for the lightness of this realization. Whatever you do, don’t keep this brilliance to yourself. Share it loudly, widely, and generously.
Virgo Rising
April stands to be a decisive month for creating more spaciousness in your life to travel, learn, and live abroad. But this is very much a “one door opening because another one closed” scenario. There may be key relationships and business collaborations ending for you this month, or at least reaching the end of a particular road and being forced to evolve. “Divorces” are always heavy and mired in particulars, and the particulars of this transition might consume a lot of your attention this month. But there’s a pretty considerable silver lining to all of this, especially if the dissolution of this joint venture represents the dissolution of the thing that was preventing you from embracing the adventure of a lifetime.
Mercury will be retrograde from April 1 through 25, and this represents the part of the story where you’re handling the logistics of your shared assets, reconsolidating your debt, or submitting all the necessary paperwork to change your tax structure (all the usual Mercury Retrograde rules apply: check your work and check it twice). The solar eclipse on the 8th, which is accompanied by a Mars-Saturn conjunction, emphasizes that this is probably a jarring and signification transition you’re moving through, and that there may be no going back to what things were. It’s an act of love and grace to acknowledge when something isn’t working anymore, and to honor what you had by letting it become whatever it needs to become next.
The big liftoff moment is around the April 20, when Jupiter and Uranus conjoin in the part of your chart associated with journeys of all kinds: international, educational, and existential. There may be tangible opportunities opening up for you to embark on a powerful experience—one that may involve airfare, books, or prayer beads. But don’t overlook the significant shifts that are happening internally for you as well. The liberation of your soul is the bottom line of what’s at stake, and the evolution of your perspective is about to bear lots of fruit.
Libra Rising
What, or whom, have you sacrificed yourself for lately? As you move through the eye of a needle (and a whirlwind of change), consider that the excess baggage you’ve had to release recently was just a load of untruth, and that your willingness to take one for the team is sending ripples through not just your timeline, but at least one other person’s.
Your shared destiny is what’s looming large in front of you this month, and even as you run into a major problem that needs troubleshooting, it’s the way you work through it together that’s most important. From the 1st through the 25th, Mercury Retrograde puts your contracts up for renegotiation and draws you back into the fold of conversations you didn’t think you’d have to revisit again. But as the eclipse on April 8 looms near, the only way forward is through, and you’ll have to make a deliberate choice to meet this moment with courage, bravery, and all the conviction in your heart. Does this mean pushing past your relationship wounding in order to risk your heart once more? Does it mean committing to working through your problems at the point where you’d normally run away? Either way, these eclipses are not light work, and the choices you make right now could alter your life trajectory in a meaningful way.
All of this is also amounting to profound perspective shifts internally (or maybe even a lucrative opportunity of some kind, or resources that materialize to make your possibilities wider). As the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction convenes on April 20, you might feel yourself releasing your grip on fear, grief, and death itself. To be clear, this process will meet you wherever you are, but if you have some heavy emotions to unburden yourself of, you might not be content to travel in a superficial way this month. Consider reserving experiences for yourself that will let you engage with spirit, or with profound learning.
Scorpio Rising
Things might be up in the air at work this month as coworkers come, coworkers go, and your deadlines get scrambled in the air. Alternatively, you might be moving through a profound healing process as you get a revised diagnosis or change up your health regimen. The combined impact of the Mercury Retrograde and the eclipse in your sixth house of work and health will turn things upside down for you, but sometimes a better solution can be found inside the flux—one that addresses the problem at the root. The first week of the month will disrupt the stasis of whatever you’ve currently been doing, and the rest of the month will be mostly for sorting through the details. But it’s also how you troubleshoot, and how you collaborate with others in your midst, that tracks the course of your destiny.
Some of these changes may invariably involve your creative processes, the things you do for fun, or your children, if you have any. The Mars-Saturn conjunction on the April 10 is very much tied in with this eclipse, and it represents some sort of crisis or nonstarter that forces your hand to make a change. Perhaps you have to quit one of your favorite hobbies to better tend to your health or work/life balance. Maybe your kids are having a hard time, and you’ll need to adjust some schedules or infuse their routines with healthier practices.
In the meantime, something is lifting at the same time that something is crashing—and for you, that lift might have to do with who’s by your side through all of this. As the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction perfects on the 20th, the big blessing that’s becoming apparent to you is that at least you’ve got each other. Maybe until now, you weren’t even aware of who was in your corner, or what a good catch they were. Perhaps your romantic or business partner is themselves going through a profound liberation of some kind, or having a brilliant stroke of an idea to link up with you in some way. Is taking on some of their burden your way of assisting their glow up?
Sagittarius Rising
Even if all is not at peace in your kingdom this month, can an untenable situation at home somehow be the push needed to accelerate toward a fuller life? If things are breaking down within your family unit, will this be the straw that breaks the camel’s back, and ultimately leads you to choose the wellbeing of its youngest members above all else?
April is a meal of a month, and not all of it will be easy going down—but at the very least, your determination to get your cake should supersede all. The combined impact of a Mercury Retrograde and an eclipse in your fifth house of hobbies, creativity, and children means that ultimately, joy is your priority, and you might need to rearrange some things in your life in order to pursue the most generative expression of your life force. Between April 8 and 10, the solar eclipse is accompanied by the Mars-Saturn conjunction, and that’s when problems at home spur you to make a change. Perhaps you’ll be forced to move out of that apartment that stifled your creative energy anyway, or maybe you’ll have to make some housing decisions with the needs of your kids in mind. If divine intervention lets you break your lease early, will that free you to go frolic in another country for some time?
“Getting free” is very much a part of this whole sequence of events, and in your case, it might directly involve your health or your job responsibilities. The Jupiter-Uranus conjunction on the 20th sets you up for a big jailbreak from your cubicle (remote life anyone?), a sudden upgrade for your wellbeing, and/or deep, internal shifts related to how you understand your responsibilities, your debt of service to the world, and even the patterns of misfortune in your life.
Capricorn Rising
Your brainchild is just about ready to be born, but you might have to go through some labor pains to fully bring it into the world. This April, there are traffic jams, communication breakdowns, and written drafts getting crumpled up on the way to your big debut, but try not to see that as a setback—for whatever reason, these friction points are adding the missing ingredient to whatever you’re cooking.
Your living situation, family ties, and ancestry is also playing a loud role in all of this. From April 1st through 25th, Mercury will retrograde through your 4th house of roots. On April 8th, a solar eclipse punctuates the same place in your chart. There might be a move in your near future, or perhaps just a deeper, braver confrontation of your family history than you’ve been capable of in the past. Guided by a Mars-Saturn conjunction on the 10th, this bungee-jump of healing is perhaps instigated by problems that are manifesting with friends, siblings, and extended family—or maybe it’s not that deep, and you’re literally just moving because you can’t stand your commute. Either way, a new lease on home provides a new lease on life, and perhaps a less avoidant relationship with your past.
About that brainchild, though. As the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction perfects on the 20th, you, too, will be ready to pop with a creative genius that’s perfected and made more whole because of everything that’s been coming up for you this month. Maybe the original version of whatever you were working on was like the first pancake, and your initial frustration with it made the end result better. Maybe this has very little to do with a tangible creation, and more to do with your expanded relationship toward pleasure of all kinds. You are your ancestors to some extent, but you don’t have to live under their glass ceiling of happiness. Break generational curses by choosing your own joy.
Aquarius Rising
Not all who wander are lost, and in your case, being divinely rerouted by circumstances beyond your control might be the very thing needed to put you on the fastest route to your destination. Yes, this is probably about any ongoing sagas around your money and housing situation, and yes, that doesn’t mutually exclude the inroads you’ve been taking into deeper relationship with some of your closest kin. The question this April is: which stories merit rewriting, and where can returning to what’s familiar put you back in touch with the truth?
The majority of this month will be spent revisiting the emails you’ve been keeping in your drafts, catching up with friends and family members you haven’t seen in awhile, recalculating your daily commute, and attempting to settle into a new rhythm for your daily routines. From the 1st through the 25th, Mercury is retrograde in Aries, encouraging you to double back to the past in order to find the most direct through lines to efficiency and truth. On the 8th, a solar eclipse lights up the same part of your chart, showing you that the only way forward is through the pain and fear. The Mars-Saturn conjunction happening on the 10th is part of what leads you here, and yes, unfortunately, this will likely involve some sort of financial setback. Does a current lack of cash flow necessitate a pivot around your content strategy? Is a momentary blow to your independence an opportunity to lean into your support network? Will a big hole in your travel budget encourage you to fall in love more deeply with your own backyard?
There’s a bigger picture here, and it has to do with your deepening connection to family, roots, and “home” as an existential condition in a world where the tectonic plates are constantly shifting. The Jupiter-Uranus conjunction on the 20th is the culmination of a longer wisdom process you’ve been undertaking for the last year, and perhaps you’ve had to search far and wide for the meaning of something that’s quite literally been under your feet this entire time.
Pisces Rising
At the end of the day, you’re the only person who determines when enough is enough. You’re the only one who knows where the limits to your generosity and capacity lie, and you’re the only one who can really say when you’ve failed or messed up. This month’s Mars-Saturn conjunction in Pisces, happening on April 10, is powered by the high-wattage impact of an eclipse in Aries. There are changes coming to your financial situation, perhaps, and the way you make money. There is, beneath everything, an impetus to become more self-reliant. But sometimes, the most important decisions we make aren’t choices we willingly walk into, but the ones we surrender to when we’re out of other options.
If you feel yourself coming up against your edges, or even crashing and burning into a wall, look to what is indicated by your gas meter. Are you running on fumes? Are you sufficiently fed? Are you pouring into someone else’s cup while yours is empty? All month, the Mercury Retrograde in your second house of resources finds you going back over your balance sheets and taking inventory. On April 8, the solar eclipse in the same part of your chart presents you with choices or opportunities to increase your cash flow, conserve your resources in the name of self-preservation, or accumulate more equipment to put in your travel bag. You’ll need to pack well to get where you’re going. What is coming with you on this reconnaissance mission?
It wouldn’t be altogether surprising if some of this involves a brainchild you’ve been cooking up, or a bright idea for a new offering or teaching you can monetize. As we build toward the Jupiter-Uranus conjunction on the 20th, your mental output becomes increasingly inspired the more you feed yourself with stimulating conversation and interaction with your local environment. In the words of Kafka, “You do not need to leave your room. Remain sitting at your table and listen. Do not even listen, simply wait, be quiet, still and solitary. The world will freely offer itself to you to be unmasked, it has no choice, it will roll in ecstasy at your feet.”
Enjoyed your April 2024 horoscope? Look back on March to see how things lined up.