Wheel of Fortune: tarot card meaning

In A. E. Waite's Pictorial Key to the Tarot (1910), the Wheel of Fortune upright means: Destiny, fortune, success, elevation, luck, felicity. Reversed: Increase, abundance, superfluity.

The picture

“In this symbol I have again followed the reconstruction of Éliphas Lévi, who has furnished several variants. It is legitimate, as I have intimated, to use Egyptian symbolism when this serves our purpose, provided that no theory of origin is implied therein. I have, however, presented Typhon in his serpent form. The symbolism is, of course, not exclusively Egyptian, as the four Living Creatures of Ezekiel occupy the angles of the card, and the wheel itself follows other indications of Lévi in respect of Ezekiel's vision, as illustrative of the particular Tarot Key. With the French occultist, and in the design itself, the symbolic picture stands for the perpetual motion of a fluidic universe and for the flux of human life. The Sphinx is the equilibrium therein. The transliteration of Taro as Rota is inscribed on the wheel, counterchanged with the letters of the Divine Name, to shew that Providence is implied through all. But this is the Divine intention within, and the similar intention without is exemplified by the four Living Creatures. Sometimes the sphinx is represented couchant on a pedestal above, which defrauds the symbolism by stultifying the essential idea of stability amidst movement. Behind the general notion expressed in the symbol there lies the denial of chance and the fatality which is implied therein. It may be added that, from the days of Lévi onward, the occult explanations of this card are, even for occultism itself, of a singularly fatuous kind. It has been said to mean principle, fecundity, virile honour, ruling authority, etc. The findings of common fortune-telling are better than this on their own plane.” A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot, 1910

Upright

Destiny, fortune, success, elevation, luck, felicity.

Reversed

Increase, abundance, superfluity.

In one line

Destiny, fortune, luck: the wheel turns. (Esbat's own summary of Waite's meaning and picture.)

Where it sits in the deck

The Wheel of Fortune is card X of the 22 Major Arcana, the trumps. Before it comes The Hermit; after it, Justice.

In Esbat

Esbat deals a card of the day, face down until you turn it, and holds all 78 cards in the 1910 pictures with Waite's meanings, upright and reversed. The Wheel of Fortune can be shared as a picture. All 78 tarot card meanings.

Sources

Meanings and picture descriptions: A. E. Waite, The Pictorial Key to the Tarot (London: Rider, 1910), public domain, checked against the Wikisource transcription. Picture: Pamela Colman Smith, 1910, public domain. Like the app, this page records what the book says; it does not promise outcomes.

Last updated October 25, 2026.

Esbat: Tarot & Book of Shadows, on Google Play

A card of the day, face down until you turn it, and all 78 cards in the 1910 pictures with Waite's meanings, upright and reversed. For Android.

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