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Reversals

How to read tarot reversals

A reversed card is one that comes out of the shuffle upside down. This guide teaches one way to read it: four lenses that work on every card in the deck, and three steps for choosing between them in a reading.

Updated October 2026·6 min read

The cover of Reading Reversals, a printable tarot guide: four ways to read a reversed card, applied to all 78 cards, with the High Priestess shown upside down. — **Reading Reversals**The method on this page as a 55-page printable PDF, with four reversed readings for each of the 78 cards. US Letter and A4. Get it on Etsy

What a reversal is

A card can only come up reversed if part of the deck faces the other way. Readers who use reversals turn some of the cards around while they shuffle. Readers who don't use them keep every card facing the same way, and their decks never deal one. So reading reversals is a choice you make before you shuffle.

Readers who make that choice disagree about what a reversal means more than about anything else in tarot. Some read the opposite of the upright meaning. Some read the upright meaning weakened or delayed. The method here keeps the upright meaning whole and reads the reversal as a change in the energy around it.

Do you have to read reversals?

No. Reading every card upright is a complete way to read tarot, and it's the right place to start. Reversals sit on top of the upright meanings, so they only help once those meanings come to you without a book. If you still look most cards up, read everything upright for now, as the guide to learning tarot suggests.

When the upright deck feels solid, turn part of the deck around as you shuffle. Reversals will start turning up in your next reading.

The four lenses

In this method a reversed card keeps its upright meaning. The reversal changes the energy around that meaning, and the change can go four ways. This guide calls them the four lenses. Each lens is a way of looking at the upright meaning.

Here they are on the Hermit. Upright, the Hermit is Solitude: stepping back on purpose to think things through.

The Hermit tarot card, upside down: an old figure in gray robes alone on a snowy peak, a raised lantern holding a six-pointed star, a long staff in his other hand. — The Hermit, reversed. Each reading here comes from his card page. Save the four lenses to Pinterest Rider–Waite–Smith, 1909 · public domain

Blocked

The energy is there, but something is in the way.

“You need time alone to think things through, but between your commitments and the people around you, you can't get the space.”

Internal

The energy has turned inward. A lot is moving inside you, and none of it shows on the outside yet.

“You've found insight in your time alone, but you haven't brought any of it back to the people who could use it.”

Excess

There's too much of the card. Its quality is still there, but it has stopped serving you.

“Your time alone has gone on too long, and the reflection has turned into isolation.”

Shadow

This is the downside of the card's own strength: the card is working, but it's costing you something.

“You withdraw whenever things get hard and call it soul-searching, while the problems you left wait for you.”

All four lenses apply to every card in the deck, and nothing about a reversal tells you which one to use. You choose it, and the next section shows how.

Read a reversal in three steps

Say the upright meaning. Put what the card means upright into a few plain words. If you skip this step, you're guessing.
Pick the lens. Ask the four lens questions below about that upright meaning. Look for the answers in three places, in order, and stop as soon as only one lens is left.
Say it in one sentence. Describe what the upright meaning looks like through that lens, in your situation.

The lens questions

In each question, “it” is the card's upright meaning.

Blocked: Is something holding it up?
Internal: Is it happening only inside you?
Excess: Is there too much of it?
Shadow: Is it working, but costing you something?

Where to look

You look for the lens in three places, in this order: the card's position in the spread, the other cards around it, and your own situation. Each place rules some lenses out.

Then test your sentence: find the card in it. Some of its words should come from the upright meaning. If none do, the sentence has drifted off the card, so go back to step one.

The printable sets out the rules for each place, then works through three full readings, one for each: a Celtic Cross that starts from the position, three cards that drop out of the deck while you shuffle, and a single card read against your situation.

Does a reversed card mean the opposite?

Not in this method. Reading the opposite gives you 156 meanings to learn instead of 78, and it throws away the meaning of the card you drew. Keep the upright meaning, and the 78 meanings you already know cover the reversals too. Numbers work the same way: a reversed Five is still a Five.

A reversal doesn't make a card bad, either. A reversed Sun still carries Joy, and through Internal it reads, “You feel happy and full of energy again, though you haven't let anyone see it.” A reversed Death still carries Endings, and through Internal it reads, “You've let go of something on the inside, but your daily life hasn't caught up with the change yet.”

The printable guide

Reading Reversals is this method as a printable PDF, made by Little Grimoire. It's for readers who already know the upright meanings and want to start reading reversals. The guide's 55 pages include:

Two pages on how reversals work, then the four lenses, shown on the Eight of Wands
The three steps on a single page, to keep with your deck
Three readings worked step by step: a Celtic Cross, three cards that drop out of the deck while you shuffle, and a single card
A practice sheet that walks you through one reversed card, and the same sheet filled in for an example reading
All 78 cards, Major and Minor Arcana, each with its upright keyword, its card image upside down, and four reversed readings
A divider page for the Majors and for each suit

Page 6 of Reading Reversals: the first worked reading, a Celtic Cross with a reversed Ace of Wands. — Pages 6, 9 and 12: the first of the three worked readings, the practice sheet filled in, and the first card page.

Page 9 of Reading Reversals: the practice sheet, filled in for one reading. — Pages 6, 9 and 12: the first of the three worked readings, the practice sheet filled in, and the first card page.

You get four PDF files: the guide and a blank practice sheet, each in US Letter and A4. Print the practice sheet as often as you like. Everything prints on a home printer and still reads in black and white.

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Instant download · Digital file only · For personal use

Reversed meanings, card by card

Every page in the card reference has that card's four reversed readings. Each link below goes straight to them.

Practice reversals in the app

Little Grimoire teaches tarot in short lessons, with practice for every card. Its section on reversals uses the same four lenses and has a drill on picking the lens. It opens when you finish the Book of Tarot.

Google Play App Store

First two lessons free · No subscription · iPhone and Android

Before reversalsHow to learn tarot Positions and spreadsHow to read a tarot spread