Astrolium's astrocartography compare tool is the side-by-side ranking layer. Feed in 2–5 cities a client is weighing, and the calculator scores each one against the birth chart across 14 life areas, with a comparison matrix, overall ranking, balanced-choice flag, and per-area winner. Crossings within 250 km of each city get weighted as paran-grade signals. Use it once the shortlist is in hand and the consultation question is "which of these places, for what."
The compare uses the /v3/astrocartography/compare-locations endpoint. It runs the full astrocartography line set for each city, computes the strength of planetary influence on each of the 14 life areas, and returns rankings, recommendations, and a matrix the calculator renders as a side-by-side table. Line orb is read out to roughly 700 km on the strongest contacts. Standard practitioner workflow: city finder narrows from the world, compare reads what the search narrowed to.
What the comparison shows
The result has five reading layers:
- Best overall — the city with the highest combined score across all 14 areas, with its rating label and overall score.
- Balanced choice — when different from the winner, this is the city with the most evenly supportive profile. A city with the highest peak in one area is not always the city that supports a broad relocation; the balanced choice surfaces the latter.
- Overall rankings — every city you compared, ordered by overall score, with the strongest and weakest areas for each. Useful for spotting why one city won.
- Comparison matrix — 14 rows (life areas) by N columns (cities), with a score bar and number in each cell. The fastest way to read where each city is strong and where it falls down.
- Best for each area — 14 small cards mapping each life area to the city that scored highest for it. Useful when you want to know which city to pick if you are optimising for a single area rather than the overall.
Each city also gets a list of recommendations from the API — short notes flagging where the city needs extra effort or where it shines. These are shown in the underlying API response and surface key takeaways without you having to read the matrix line by line.
When to use compare versus search
The two tools answer different questions.
The astrocartography search asks "across the world, which cities support this area of my life?" — useful when you have no specific candidates and want a top-10 ranking from a global pool.
The compare asks "of these 2–5 cities I am already considering, which one wins?" — useful when you have a current home, a target city, and maybe a wildcard, and want a head-to-head read across every life area.
Most relocation reads use both. Run the search first to surface cities you might not have considered. Add your top picks (plus your current home, as a baseline) into the compare to see them all on one screen.
Reading the matrix
The 14 life areas are not weighted equally for everyone. A relocation read for someone planning a family will weight home, health, and relationships. A read for someone changing careers will weight career, communication, and wealth. The matrix is structured so you can scan the rows that matter to you and ignore the rest.
Pay attention to the spread inside each row. A row where all cities score 25–35 is uninteresting — the chart does not differentiate between them on that area. A row where one city scores 55 and the others score 25 is where the comparison earns its keep. The wider the gap, the more decisive the area is for choosing between those specific cities.
Pay attention to the column too. A city with consistent moderate scores across all 14 areas is a different proposition from a city with two peaks and twelve weak rows. The first is the "balanced choice" pattern; the second is the "specialist" pattern. Both have their place — a specialist city for a one-area move can outperform a balanced city if the one area matters most.
Ratings and how to read them
Each area returns a numeric score (0–100) and a rating label:
- Good — strong supportive planetary contacts on the relevant angle. Expect noticeable lift in that area.
- Moderate — mixed contacts or moderate-strength supports. The area is reasonably supported but not amplified.
- Weak — few or scattered contacts. The area is neither helped nor hindered much.
- Challenging — hard contacts (Saturn, Mars, Pluto) on the relevant angle. The area is more demanding here, though not necessarily worse — Saturn lines are often where serious work gets done.
Score ranges roughly map to those labels: 50+ is good, 35–50 moderate, 20–35 weak, below 20 challenging. The actual cutoffs are computed per chart, so the ratings adjust to your specific planetary geometry.
After the comparison
The compare delivers the strongest signal about which candidate city fits which life area. A close result (top two within three points) usually means the chart genuinely supports both for the area in question; the call comes down to non-astrological factors. A wide spread is a decisive read.
Related practitioner tools
- Astrocartography Map — visual scan of all 28 planetary lines on one world map
- Astrocartography Calculator — score a single location against the chart
- Astrocartography City Finder — search 200+ cities by life area
- Astrocartography Power Zones — top 12 line crossings and paran zones
- Relocation Chart — full relocated chart for any city
- Local Space Chart — directional lines from the birth place
For deeper interpretation, see the astrocartography hub guide. For the timing layer over the next 12 months, pair the compare with the transit report and the profections calculator. For the natal foundation, run the natal chart report.