Qibla direction in Ciudad Obregón

How to face the Qibla in Ciudad Obregón

Stand where you will pray and find north first. Then turn towards north and move a further 34.0° towards east: the result is the bearing of 34.0°. Because the angle sits far from the cardinal points, a rough guess such as “north” would be off by more than 30°, which is why a measured bearing matters in Ciudad Obregón.

Facing the Qibla is a condition of the prayer. Whoever prays inside the Sacred Mosque faces the Kaaba itself; whoever is far away, as in Ciudad Obregón, faces its direction and makes a sincere effort to be accurate. A nearby mosque is a handy reference, because its prayer rows were aligned when it was built. Once you know the direction at home, a discreet mark on the wall saves you from checking again.

Why a flat map shows a different direction

This is a place where maps mislead badly: a straight line on a flat map from Ciudad Obregón to Mecca points to 92.5° (east), a full 58.6° away from the true Qibla of 34.0° (north-east). The map line keeps one compass heading and is 1,485 km longer than the great-circle route. Because the Earth is a sphere, the shortest way to Mecca from Ciudad Obregón first heads north-east, and that is the direction to face.

How is the figure of 34.0° obtained? From the coordinates of Ciudad Obregón (27.4864° N, 109.9408° W) and of the Kaaba (21.4225° N, 39.8262° E), spherical trigonometry gives the starting bearing of the great circle joining them. Mosque architects and astronomical Qibla tables rely on exactly the same calculation.

Distance from Ciudad Obregón to Mecca and Medina

Mecca is 13,679 km from Ciudad Obregón as the crow flies, and Medina, the city of the Prophet ﷺ, is 13,380 km away. A direct flight would take roughly 16 h 36 min, although most pilgrims from Ciudad Obregón connect through Jeddah or Medina airport.

Clocks in Ciudad Obregón run 10 hours behind Mecca all year. Prayer times, however, depend on the sun at your own location, so always use the prayer times of Ciudad Obregón rather than those of Mecca.

Finding the Qibla with the sun in Ciudad Obregón

From Ciudad Obregón the sun never rises high in the Qibla direction of 34.0°, so you cannot simply face the sun. The opposite method works instead, as the right-hand column of the table shows.

On 365 days the sun stands exactly opposite the Qibla: then the shadow of any vertical object, a pole, a door frame or a plumb line, points straight towards Mecca. This is most frequent in January (31 days), for instance on 1 January 2027 at 14:29.

Twice a year the sun passes directly over the Kaaba, on 28 May 2027 and 16 July 2027. Both happen at night in Ciudad Obregón (02:18 and 02:27 local time), so they cannot be used here. Instead, on 13 January 2027 at 14:29 and 28 November 2027 at 14:09 the sun is over the point opposite the Kaaba, and every vertical shadow in Ciudad Obregón points straight to Mecca.

Ciudad Obregón compared with other cities

Compared with Mexico City, 1,420 km away, the Qibla in Ciudad Obregón is turned 12.6° further anticlockwise (34.0° against 46.6°), and Mecca is 33 km farther away. The nearest city with its own Qibla page, Navojoa (67 km), prays towards 34.6°, a difference of 0.6°.

Across the 99 cities in Mexico on this site, the Qibla ranges from 25.5° in Rosarito to 54.2° in Chetumal, a spread of 28.7°. That is too large to use one national direction, so each city has its own bearing.

See all cities on the Qibla page for Mexico.

Qibla in cities near Ciudad Obregón

• Navojoa34.6° · 67 km
• Guaymas32.9° · 106 km
• Hermosillo32.5° · 205 km
• Los Mochis35.5° · 211 km
• Cuauhtémoc36.5° · 319 km
• La Paz, Baja California Sur, Mexico34.9° · 374 km