How to Charge Tarot Cards With Your Energy: Methods

Why people “charge” their cards

Tarot readers who follow this tradition explain it like this: the deck “absorbs” its owner’s energy and “responds” better. There is no way to test this, so we describe charging as a ritual for getting attuned, not as a condition for an “accurate reading”.

What really works is something else: the more often you hold the deck and look at the cards, the better you know them and the more confidently you read spreads.

Five common methods

With your hands. Hold the deck in your palms and sit quietly for a few minutes, thinking about why you do readings. Then slowly go through all the cards.
Carrying it with you. Keep the deck with you for a few days: in your bag, by your bed.
Moonlight. Leaving the cards on a windowsill overnight during a full moon is a popular ritual. Important: the deck should not lie in direct sunlight during the day, or the colors will fade.
Candle or incense. Passing the deck over a candle flame or through smoke symbolizes fire and air. Be careful: cards burn.
Through practice. A week of drawing a card of the day is the simplest and most useful method: the cards are “charged” by your attention.

How to charge a deck for the first time

With a new deck, charging is usually combined with getting acquainted, which is called activation. A step-by-step method is in the article “How to activate new tarot cards”.

How often to charge your cards

There is no firm rule. The usual advice is:

after you buy it, once, together with activation;
if the deck has gone unused for a long time;
after heavy readings, in which case people usually “cleanse” it first and then charge it (how to cleanse tarot cards).

What not to do

Wet the cards with water, salt or herbal infusions: the cardstock will swell.
Keep the deck near an open flame.
Leave the cards in the sun: the colors will fade.
Believe that a reading “won’t work” without charging: a reading depends on the question and the interpretation, not on a ritual (more on this in the article “Can tarot cards be wrong?”).

Frequently asked questions

How do I charge tarot cards with my energy?

The simplest way is to hold the deck in your hands for a few minutes, go through all the cards, and draw a card of the day for a week. This is a tradition, not a mandatory rule.

Do you need to charge tarot cards?

Not necessarily. Classic tarot manuals contain no such rite; charging helps you get attuned, but the accuracy of a reading depends on the question and the interpretation.

Can you charge tarot cards in the sun?

Better not: the colors will fade. Those who value the symbolism are usually advised to use moonlight at night instead.

How this article was prepared

This text was written with the help of AI, based on the sources listed below and on the questions people actually search for. Every factual statement — about the history of decks, what a deck contains, what authors wrote — has a footnote. The text was then checked by a separate AI instance that took no part in writing it: it compared the facts with the footnotes, and errors were corrected. The English version is a translation of the original Russian article.

We describe reading practices — how to shuffle, charge or “cleanse” a deck — as traditions and habits of tarot readers, not as proven methods: there is no scientific evidence for divination. Read more on our editorial policy page. Found a mistake? Let us know via the contact form.