Qibla direction in Pretoria

How to face the Qibla in Pretoria

Stand where you will pray and find north first. Then turn towards north and move a further 14.5° towards east: the result is the bearing of 14.5°. A small error of a few degrees is forgiven by most scholars, but aiming simply at north would leave you about 15° off.

Scholars agree that someone who can see the Kaaba must face it exactly, while someone far away faces its direction (jihat al-Ka‘bah) as precisely as reasonably possible. The simplest check in Pretoria is a local mosque: its mihrab and prayer lines already point to the Qibla. See the mosques of Pretoria. At home, mark the direction once with tape or a small arrow so the whole family prays the same way.

Why a flat map shows a different direction

On a flat (Mercator) map, the straight line from Pretoria to Mecca points to 13.5°, only 1.1° away from the true Qibla. Here the two methods practically agree, so a map gives a usable first idea, although the 14.5° bearing remains the exact one.

The angle on this page is the initial bearing of the great circle from 25.7449° S, 28.1878° E to the Kaaba (21.4225° N, 39.8262° E). It is the method used by mosque architects and by every serious Qibla calculator, and it gives one exact answer for each point on Earth.

Distance from Pretoria to Mecca and Medina

Mecca is 5,393 km from Pretoria as the crow flies, and Medina, the city of the Prophet ﷺ, is 5,717 km away. A direct flight would take roughly 6 h 51 min, although most pilgrims from Pretoria connect through Jeddah or Medina airport.

Clocks in Pretoria run 1 hour behind Mecca all year. Prayer times, however, depend on the sun at your own location, so always use the prayer times of Pretoria rather than those of Mecca.

Finding the Qibla with the sun in Pretoria

On 365 days of 2027, the sun passes exactly through the Qibla direction of Pretoria while it is well above the horizon. At that moment, facing the sun means facing Mecca. The effect is most frequent in January (31 days); for example, on 1 January 2027 it happens at 12:08 local time.

The sun is never opposite the Qibla of Pretoria during daylight, so the shadow method does not apply here; the left-hand column is the one to use.

Twice a year the sun passes directly over the Kaaba, on 28 May 2027 and 16 July 2027. Both moments are in daylight in Pretoria: at 11:18 and 11:27 local time, face the sun and you face the Qibla exactly, anywhere in the city.

Pretoria compared with other cities

The nearest city with its own Qibla page, Thembisa (28 km), prays towards 14.4°, a difference of 0.1°.

Across the 59 cities in South Africa on this site, the Qibla ranges from 9.4° in Richards Bay to 23.4° in Cape Town, a spread of 14.0°. That is too large to use one national direction, so each city has its own bearing.

See all cities on the Qibla page for South Africa.

Qibla in cities near Pretoria

• Thembisa14.4° · 28 km
• Soshanguve14.7° · 32 km
• Hammanskraal14.5° · 39 km
• Brits15.0° · 43 km
• Etwatwa14.1° · 50 km
• Benoni14.3° · 51 km