Jeddah & Mecca Total Eclipse
The umbra crosses the Red Sea into the Hejaz for six more minutes.
The Moon’s shadow leaves Egypt over the Red Sea and comes ashore again in the Hejaz. Jeddah gets 5 minutes 59 seconds of totality from 13:22:20 to 13:28:19 local time (UTC+3) on Monday 2 August 2027, with the Sun 76° above the horizon. One second short of six minutes, in a city of four million people, with an international airport attached.
Because Saudi Arabia and Egypt share the same clock, the handover is easy to follow. Totality begins at Berenice, on the Egyptian coast, at 13:10:44. Eleven and a half minutes later the same shadow is over Jeddah. In between it crosses 400 km of open water, and anybody on a ship in the middle of the Red Sea that day is in for something remarkable.
Jeddah is the last really substantial city the umbra passes over. Beyond here it runs south-east across Arabia, clips Yemen, crosses the Gulf of Aden into Somalia, and dies in the Indian Ocean at sunset. This is, in effect, the closing act of a very long day.
The eclipse from Jeddah & Mecca, minute by minute
All times are UTC+3 on Monday 2 August 2027.
- 12:00 First contact The Moon takes its first bite out of the Sun’s edge. Nothing is visible without eclipse glasses — put them on now.
- 13:22:20 Totality begins — second contact The last sliver breaks into Baily’s beads, then the diamond ring. When the ring goes out, glasses off.
- 13:25:20 Mid-eclipse Deepest darkness. The corona surrounds a black Sun 76° above the horizon; look for planets and the horizon glow.
- 13:28:19 Totality ends — third contact A second diamond ring flares on the opposite limb. Glasses back on the instant it appears.
- 14:43 Fourth contact The Moon leaves the Sun’s disc and the eclipse is over.
| Eclipse type | Total |
|---|---|
| Duration of totality | 5m 59s |
| Maximum obscuration | 100% |
| Eclipse magnitude | 1.029 |
| Sun’s altitude at maximum | 76° |
| Sun’s azimuth at maximum | 257° |
| Mid-eclipse (UTC) | 10:25:20 |
Jeddah & Mecca on the eclipse map
The gold band is the path of totality. Click anywhere to test a spot of your own — a few kilometres genuinely matters.
The gateway city, and what it looks like now
Jeddah has been the port of arrival for pilgrims to Mecca for fourteen centuries, and everything about the place follows from that: a city built by people from everywhere, on a coast that faces Africa, whose entire purpose was to be somewhere you passed through. It calls itself the Bride of the Red Sea.
Al-Balad
The historic core, inscribed by UNESCO as Historic Jeddah, Gate to Makkah, is one of the strangest and most beautiful old towns anywhere on this eclipse track. Its tower houses are built of coral stone — blocks quarried from the Red Sea reefs — bonded with lime and timber, rising four and five storeys, and hung with rawasheen: projecting wooden lattice screens, carved and shuttered, that catch the sea breeze and keep the interiors private and cool. Some are painted turquoise, some left the colour of old teak. Naseef House, where a tree grew in the courtyard because there were so few in the city, is the best known.
Much of Al-Balad is under long-term restoration and the district is being progressively reopened; what is accessible in 2027 is not something anyone can state today. But for a partial-phase wander before the eclipse — narrow shaded lanes, coral walls, crescents of light falling through the lattices onto the ground — there is nothing better in the country.
The rest of the city
- The Corniche. Thirty kilometres of reworked waterfront along the Red Sea, with open sky, sculpture, and the King Fahd Fountain offshore — the tallest of its kind in the world, throwing seawater more than 250 metres up. West-facing, which matters: at totality the Sun is at azimuth 257°, out over the sea.
- The reefs. The Red Sea coast north and south of the city has excellent diving, and a boat offshore gives the unbroken horizon that makes totality so much better.
- Taif and the escarpment. Inland the ground climbs steeply to the Sarawat mountains, and Taif sits at around 1,800 m in air that is dramatically cooler and drier than the coast. See the weather section below before assuming that is the better choice.
Mecca, and a necessary practical note
Mecca lies about 66 km inland from Jeddah, and the two are named together in the eclipse data because they share the same corner of the path.
Entry to Mecca is restricted to Muslims. This is a legal restriction, signposted on the approach roads, and it applies regardless of the reason for travel. For non-Muslim visitors, an eclipse itinerary in the Hejaz is a Jeddah-and-coast itinerary, and the difference in what you will see is small — the two cities are close together relative to a path 258 km wide.
For Muslim travellers the position is different, and the coincidence is a striking one: a total solar eclipse over the Hejaz, in the middle of a Monday afternoon. It is worth noting that Islamic tradition includes a specific prayer for eclipses, salat al-kusuf, performed when the Sun is eclipsed; the practice is well established and predates any modern eclipse chasing by a very long way.
Timing relative to the Hajj
The Islamic calendar is lunar, so the Hajj moves roughly eleven days earlier each year; in 2027 it falls well before August. Umrah, however, continues throughout the year, and Jeddah is busy in every season. Whatever your itinerary, book accommodation and internal travel early — this is not a city with spare capacity.
Getting there
King Abdulaziz International is one of the largest airports in the region, with long-haul connections worldwide, and Saudi Arabia now issues tourist visas to nationals of a long list of countries through an online system. Practically, Jeddah is among the easier places on this whole eclipse track to reach — easier than Libya by an enormous margin, and comparable to Egypt. The Haramain high-speed railway links Jeddah with Mecca and Medina.
The last act: what happens in the sky
Jeddah’s eclipse is the latest in the day of any location on this site, and that changes its character in a couple of interesting ways.
- 12:00 — first contact, exactly on the hour. Filters on.
- 13:10 — by now the light is visibly failing. At this moment totality is beginning on the Egyptian coast, 400 km west across the water.
- 13:22:20 — second contact. Diamond ring, then the corona, 76° up in the west-south-west. Glasses off.
- 13:25:20 — mid-eclipse. Nearly six full minutes to work with: look with your eyes first, then binoculars, then think about the camera.
- 13:28:19 — third contact. Second diamond ring. Glasses back on instantly.
- 14:43 — fourth contact, and the eclipse is over.
Watch the mountains, not the sea
At Jeddah the Sun is in the west, over the Red Sea, and the shadow is travelling from west to east. That means the umbra approaches from roughly the direction of the Sun, where it is hardest to see, and departs inland — so the spectacle to watch for is the Hejaz escarpment east of the city suddenly relighting at the end of totality, a wall of mountains coming back into the sun while you are still in the dark. Anyone positioned with a view east towards the Sarawat range has the best seat for that.
Five minutes and fifty-nine seconds unfiltered — and not one second more
From 12:00 to 13:22:20 and from 13:28:19 to 14:43 you need eye protection certified to ISO 12312-2. Between second and third contact, and only then, you must take it off — eclipse glasses render the corona completely invisible. Bring your filters with you rather than expecting to find them locally. See the eye safety guide.
Heat, humidity and the one real weather risk
Jeddah in August is genuinely punishing, and it is punishing in a different way from Egypt. Upper Egypt is a dry oven; the Red Sea coast of Arabia is a wet one. Daytime highs commonly sit around 38–40°C with humidity that does not drop much even at night, and the combination is considerably harder on the body than a hotter, drier day inland. Totality at 13:25 falls squarely in the worst part of the afternoon.
- Plan to be stationary, shaded and hydrated from noon onwards. Four litres of water per person is not excessive. Electrolytes matter more here than almost anywhere else on the track.
- Air-conditioned transport that you can retreat into between the partial phases is the single most useful piece of equipment you can arrange.
- Salt loss, not sunburn, is what catches people out in this climate.
Cloud: better than most places, worse than Egypt
The coastal plain is arid and largely cloudless, and the base odds are good. But two factors make Jeddah slightly less of a certainty than Upper Egypt:
- Humidity haze. The Red Sea in August is very warm, and the lower atmosphere over the coast carries a lot of moisture. That rarely produces cloud thick enough to hide the Sun at 76°, but it can veil the fainter outer corona.
- Afternoon convection over the escarpment. The Sarawat mountains inland can build cumulus on summer afternoons, and this is a 13:25 eclipse — later in the day, and therefore deeper into the convective cycle, than anywhere else on the track. On the coast itself this is much less of a concern than up on the escarpment or at Taif. If you are considering the mountains for the cooler air, weigh that against the cloud risk.
On balance the coastal plain around Jeddah is the safer bet meteorologically, and the sea gives you an open western horizon into the bargain.
Where the shadow goes next
Jeddah is near the end of the story. After crossing the Hejaz the umbra continues south-east over the Arabian interior, passes across Yemen, crosses the Gulf of Aden into Somalia, and finally lifts off the Earth in the Indian Ocean as the Sun sets there. From first landfall in southern Spain to the last of it over the ocean, the whole traverse takes a little over three hours.
| Place | Mid-eclipse (local) | Totality | Sun |
|---|---|---|---|
| Tarifa, Spain (UTC+2) | 10:47:24 | 4m 39s | 38° |
| Tangier, Morocco (UTC+1) | 09:47:03 | 4m 51s | 38° |
| Sfax, Tunisia (UTC+1) | 10:11:35 | 5m 40s | 56° |
| Benghazi, Libya (UTC+2) | 11:30:55 | 6m 09s | 68° |
| Luxor, Egypt (UTC+3) | 13:05:14 | 6m 20s | 82° |
| Jeddah, Saudi Arabia (UTC+3) | 13:25:20 | 5m 59s | 76° |
Jeddah is, on the numbers, the second-best of the international options after Libya — and by far the most accessible of the two. It gives up twenty-one seconds and six degrees of solar altitude against Luxor, and it costs you the Nile valley and the driest sky on the planet. But if the Hejaz is where you want to be, six minutes short of nothing is a superb eclipse. Our guide to the full path sets out every stage of the journey.
Jeddah & Mecca eclipse questions
How long does totality last in Jeddah?
5 minutes 59 seconds, from 13:22:20 to 13:28:19 local time (UTC+3) on Monday 2 August 2027, with the Sun 76° above the horizon. The partial phases run from 12:00 to 14:43.
Can non-Muslim visitors watch the eclipse from Mecca?
No. Entry to Mecca is restricted to Muslims. Non-Muslim visitors should plan around Jeddah and the Red Sea coast, which lie only about 66 km away and sit in the same part of the path, so the difference in circumstances is small.
How does Jeddah compare with Egypt?
Egypt wins, but not by much: Luxor gets 6m 20s with the Sun 82° high and among the most reliable skies on Earth, against 5m 59s at 76° in Jeddah with more humidity and a later, more convective time of day. Both are excellent. Egypt is the better bet.
What time does the shadow cross the Red Sea?
Totality begins on the Egyptian coast at Berenice at 13:10:44 and at Jeddah at 13:22:20, on the same clock — both countries keep UTC+3. The crossing of roughly 400 km of open water takes about eleven and a half minutes.
What is the weather like in Jeddah in early August?
Very hot and very humid, with highs commonly around 38–40°C and little relief at night. Skies are usually clear, though humidity haze can veil the outer corona and afternoon cloud can build over the mountains inland. The coastal plain is the safer choice for the sky.
Where does the eclipse go after Saudi Arabia?
South-east across the Arabian peninsula, then over Yemen, across the Gulf of Aden into Somalia, and finally out into the Indian Ocean, where the shadow leaves the Earth at sunset. See the path beyond Egypt for the full route.
Compare with nearby options
Benghazi
Over six minutes of totality on the Libyan coast.
Full guide → Total — 6m 20s Nile ValleyLuxor
Ancient Thebes on the centre line — the single best place on Earth to watch this eclipse.
Full guide → Total — 5m 29s Red Sea CoastMarsa Alam
Totality over coral reefs — the best resort coast inside the path.
Full guide →