Qibla Direction: History, Science and Bearings from World Cities

Five times a day, more than a billion Muslims turn to face one point on Earth: the Kaaba in Makkah. Whether you pray in Kuala Lumpur, London or Los Angeles, that direction is called the qibla. Finding it sounds simple, but the story behind it takes in revelation, a thousand years of mathematics and one surprisingly heated debate about maps.

This guide explains where the qibla came from, how Muslims have worked it out through history, and the qibla direction from major cities around the world. If you would like all of this on one page, our Qibla of the World's Major Cities poster charts the prayer direction from cities across every continent.

From Jerusalem to Makkah: the change of qibla

In the early years of Islam, the Prophet Muhammad ﷺ and his Companions prayed towards Jerusalem (Bayt al-Maqdis). After the migration to Madinah, the Prophet ﷺ longed for the direction to be turned to the Kaaba, the house built by Ibrahim and Isma'il. The answer came in Surah al-Baqarah: "We have certainly seen the turning of your face toward the heaven, and We will surely turn you to a qibla with which you will be pleased. So turn your face toward al-Masjid al-Haram. And wherever you are, turn your faces toward it" (Qur'an 2:144).

The surrounding verses (Qur'an 2:142–150) anticipate the questions people would ask, reminding believers that "to Allah belongs the east and the west" (Qur'an 2:142). According to a narration of al-Bara' ibn 'Azib in Sahih al-Bukhari, the Muslims had prayed towards Jerusalem for sixteen or seventeen months after arriving in Madinah. Bukhari also records that worshippers at Quba turned around mid-prayer when the news reached them.

The change is dated to the second year after the Hijra (2 AH, about 624 CE). Most historians and hadith commentators, including Ibn Hajar al-'Asqalani in Fath al-Bari, place it in mid-Rajab of 2 AH, while others place it in Sha'ban of the same year. The difference also explains why the reports speak of either sixteen or seventeen months.

Tradition places a similar moment at a mosque in Madinah where a congregation changed direction during the prayer itself. That mosque is known today as Masjid al-Qiblatayn, the Mosque of the Two Qiblas, and it is still visited by pilgrims.

How early Muslims found the qibla

Early Muslims used the sun and stars. As Islam spread from Spain to Central Asia, finding the qibla became one of the great problems of Islamic science.

• Spherical trigonometry. Between the 9th and 11th centuries, Muslim astronomers worked out exact methods to find the direction from one point on a sphere to another. These are the same formulas we use today.
• Al-Biruni (d. 1048). In his book on mathematical geography, Tahdid Nihayat al-Amakin, the polymath al-Biruni set out to measure the coordinates of cities so that the qibla of Ghazni, in today's Afghanistan, could be calculated.
• Qibla tables. In 14th-century Damascus, the astronomer Shams al-Din al-Khalili compiled a table giving the qibla for 2,880 combinations of latitude and longitude. Historian David King has called it the most impressive of its kind for its scope and accuracy.

Why the qibla from North America points northeast

Look at a flat world map and Makkah sits to the east and slightly south of New York. So for decades, many mosques in North America faced southeast. But the Earth is a sphere, and the shortest route between two points on a sphere is a great circle. From New York, that shortest path curves up over the North Atlantic, so the true qibla is about 58.5° from north: northeast.

In 1978, the Muslim scholar S. Kamal Abdali published work arguing for the great-circle (northeast) qibla. Others, including Riad Nachef and Samir Kadi in a 1993 book, defended the southeast direction based on the rhumb line, a path of constant compass bearing that looks straight on a flat map. Today most North American Muslims follow the northeast qibla, while a minority still face southeast.

Qibla direction from major cities

The table below gives the qibla from 60 major cities, grouped by region. Bearings are measured clockwise from true north (0° is north, 90° is east, 180° is south, 270° is west) and are the initial bearing of the great circle from each city to the Kaaba, taken as 21.4225°N, 39.8262°E. Distances are great-circle (haversine) distances using a mean Earth radius of 6,371 km, rounded to the nearest 10 km. City coordinates are approximate city-centre values, so treat the decimal place as a guide: across a large city the qibla can shift by a few tenths of a degree.

A magnetic compass points to magnetic north, not true north. The difference (magnetic declination) can be several degrees and changes over time, so check your local value or use a qibla app that corrects for it.

Notice that from Sydney the qibla is almost due west, not northwest, and from Lagos it still tilts north of east. From Nairobi and Dar es Salaam you face almost due north, and from Moscow almost due south.

Key qibla facts and figures

• The antipode of the Kaaba. The point on the exact opposite side of the Earth is at about 21.42°S, 140.17°W, in the open Pacific Ocean among the southern Tuamotu atolls of French Polynesia (roughly 50 km from Tematangi atoll; approximate). It is about 20,015 km from Makkah, half the Earth's circumference. From there every direction is a great circle that leads to Makkah, so any way you face is towards the Kaaba.
• Farthest city in our table. Auckland, New Zealand, about 15,370 km from the Kaaba, followed by Mexico City (about 13,650 km) and Los Angeles (about 13,420 km).
• Almost exactly due north: Dar es Salaam (1.2°) and, a little further off, Nairobi (7.2°). Almost due south: Madinah (176.2°) and Moscow (176.4°). Almost due east: Casablanca (93.7°). Almost due west: Delhi (266.6°) and Karachi (267.7°).
• The Kaaba's size. The Kaaba is about 13.1 m (43 ft) high. It is not a perfect cube: its walls are of unequal length, and sources give its sides as roughly 11–12.9 m by 10.2–11.5 m (one commonly quoted pair is 12.86 m by 11.03 m). Some sources give a height of up to about 15 m. These figures are approximate and vary by source and by how the base is measured.
• The four corners. The Black Stone corner (al-Rukn al-Aswad), on the east, where tawaf begins and ends; Rukn al-'Iraqi, facing roughly north towards Iraq; Rukn al-Shami, facing roughly west towards Syria (al-Sham); and Rukn al-Yamani, facing roughly south towards Yemen. The Black Stone and Yemeni corners stand on Ibrahim's original foundations.
• Hijr Isma'il (al-Hatim). The low semicircular wall of white marble on the northwest side, about 1.3 m high. The area it encloses was part of the Kaaba as Ibrahim built it but was left out when the Quraysh rebuilt the Kaaba before Islam, for lack of funds. Tawaf goes around the outside of it.
• The qibla change. 2 AH (about 624 CE), in mid-Rajab according to most scholars or in Sha'ban according to others, some sixteen or seventeen months after the Hijra.
• "Qibla" in the Qur'an. The word قبلة (qibla), with its attached forms (al-qibla, qiblatahum, qiblatak), appears 7 times in 5 verses: six times in 2:142–145 (once each in 2:142, 2:143 and 2:144, and three times in 2:145) and once in 10:87, where Musa and Harun are told to make their houses "a qibla". Counting only the stand-alone word qiblatan/qiblata (قبلة) gives 3 occurrences (2:144, 2:145, 10:87). We counted this ourselves from the Arabic text with the vowel marks removed.

The days the sun stands over the Kaaba

Twice a year, the sun passes directly overhead in Makkah at solar noon. At that moment, anyone who can see the sun simply has to face it to face the Kaaba, and every vertical object casts a shadow pointing directly away from the qibla. This method is known as rasd al-qibla.

• 27–28 May at about 12:18 Makkah time (09:18 UTC)
• 15–16 July at about 12:27 Makkah time (09:27 UTC)

How to check your qibla on these days

1. Convert the time to your local time. In Malaysia and Singapore (UTC+8) it is about 5:18 pm and 5:27 pm; in the UK during summer time (UTC+1), about 10:18 am and 10:27 am.
2. Stand a straight stick, pole or door edge upright on level ground in the sun.
3. At the exact minute, mark the line of its shadow.
4. The qibla is the opposite way to the shadow, towards the sun.

The method only works where the sun is above the horizon at that moment, so it suits Africa, Europe and most of Asia. Much of the Americas and Australia can use the "antipodal" dates instead, around 28–29 November and 12–14 January, when the sun is over the point on the opposite side of the Earth and shadows point towards the qibla.

Sun over the Kaaba: annual calendar

The table gives the moments when the sun is directly over the Kaaba (direct transits) and directly over its antipode (antipodal transits). At a direct transit, face the sun or look away from your shadow. At an antipodal transit, the qibla is the direction your shadow points. Times were calculated with a standard solar-position formula for 2027 and rounded to the minute. They shift by up to a day from year to year (for example, 27 May in 2028), so allow a few minutes either side. Local times use the clocks in force on those dates: UK summer time (UTC+1) and US Eastern daylight time (UTC−4) in May and July, and UK GMT (UTC+0), US Eastern standard time (UTC−5) and Sydney daylight time (UTC+11) in November and January.

The direct transits are useful across Africa, Europe and Asia; the antipodal ones across the Americas, Australia and New Zealand. US Eastern times in May and July fall around dawn, when the sun may be too low or not yet risen; in November and January they fall in the late afternoon, shortly before sunset.

Qur'an verses about the qibla

These are the main verses on the qibla and the Kaaba, with one-line summaries (paraphrased, not translations). The core passage is 2:142–150.

Put it on your wall

The qibla connects every Muslim household to the same House, wherever on Earth it is. The Qibla of the World's Major Cities turns that idea into a beautiful, accurate reference chart, perfect for a prayer room, classroom or as a gift.

• Premium printed poster: 50×70 cm on matte paper, $119.
• Digital download: print it at home or at your local print shop, $8.

It pairs naturally with our guide and chart of the 25 prophets in Islam, including Ibrahim and Isma'il, who raised the foundations of the Kaaba.

Frequently asked questions

What is the qibla direction from Malaysia?

From Kuala Lumpur the qibla is about 292.5° from true north, which is west-northwest. From Jakarta it is about 295.2° and from Singapore about 293.0°.

Is the qibla in the USA northeast or southeast?

Using the shortest great-circle path, the qibla from the USA and Canada is northeast (about 58.5° from New York, 54.6° from Toronto, 48.7° from Chicago and 23.9° from Los Angeles). Most North American Muslims follow this direction, though a minority still face southeast based on flat-map reasoning.

When is the sun directly over the Kaaba?

Around 27–28 May at 12:18 and 15–16 July at 12:27 Makkah time (09:18 and 09:27 UTC). At those moments, facing the sun means facing the Kaaba. The sun is over the opposite side of the Earth around 28 November at 21:09 UTC and 13 January at 21:29 UTC, when shadows point towards the qibla.

Why did the qibla change from Jerusalem to Makkah?

Allah commanded the change in Qur'an 2:144, about 16 or 17 months after the migration to Madinah (mid-Rajab or Sha'ban, 2 AH), in response to the Prophet Muhammad's ﷺ longing to face the Kaaba. The verses also describe it as a test that distinguished those who followed the Messenger ﷺ (Qur'an 2:143).

Is my prayer valid if my qibla is slightly off?

Scholars generally hold that someone far from Makkah who makes a sincere effort to find the direction has fulfilled the requirement, and a small error does not invalidate the prayer.