Most of what is taught about prayer times is about when a prayer begins. The less-discussed half is when you should not pray at all: the periods in which voluntary prayer is disliked or prohibited, known in fiqh as the makruh or forbidden times. They come from a small set of authentic hadith, and they are tied to the sun, which means their length is not fixed. It changes with the season and, dramatically, with latitude.
That matters in practice. Someone who wants to pray two voluntary rak'ahs on arriving at the mosque in the late afternoon, or to make up a missed prayer just after Fajr, needs to know whether they are inside one of these windows and how long it will last. So we computed them for four cities at both solstices.
What the hadith actually say
Two groups of narrations define the times. The first concerns the stretches after the two obligatory prayers. Abu Sa'id al-Khudri reports that the Prophet ﷺ said there is no prayer after Fajr until the sun has risen, and none after Asr until the sun has set (Bukhari 586, Muslim 827). These are periods that begin with your own prayer: once you have prayed Fajr or Asr, voluntary prayer is disliked until the sun event that ends them.
The second group concerns three moments tied to the sun itself. 'Uqbah ibn 'Amir said there were three times at which the Prophet ﷺ forbade praying or burying the dead: as the sun rises until it is fully up, when it stands at its height until it passes the meridian, and as it inclines towards setting until it has set (Muslim 831). The narration of 'Amr ibn 'Abasah in Muslim (832) adds the detail that gives this post its first measurement: refrain from prayer after sunrise until the sun has risen "a spear's length".
- After Fajr until sunrise. Begins once you have prayed Fajr.
- Sunrise until the sun is a spear's length high. Applies to everyone, whether or not they have prayed.
- The zenith (istiwa'). The sun standing at its height, just before Dhuhr begins.
- After Asr until sunset. Begins once you have prayed Asr.
- Sunset itself. The sun yellowing and descending until its disc has gone.
How long is a spear's length?
The hadith describes an observation, not an angle, and no text converts it into degrees or minutes. Scholars and timetables have operationalised it in different ways; a common rule of thumb is to wait about fifteen to twenty minutes after sunrise. We did not want to assert a single conversion, so we measured two: the time for the sun's centre to climb to 3.5° and to 5° above the horizon, a range that covers what a spear held at arm's length would plausibly span. Both are our choices, stated so you can judge them; neither is a ruling.
The result is that the rule of thumb is a tropical rule. In Makkah the sun climbs steeply and reaches 3.5° about 21 minutes after sunrise at either solstice. Further north the sun rises at a shallow slant, so the same climb takes much longer: 35 to 37 minutes in London, and in Oslo in December an hour and a half to reach 5°, on a day when the sun never gets higher than 6.6°.
| City | 21 Jun, 3.5° | 21 Jun, 5° | 21 Dec, 3.5° | 21 Dec, 5° |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Makkah | 21 | 28 | 21 | 28 |
| Istanbul | 27 | 36 | 28 | 38 |
| London | 35 | 47 | 37 | 52 |
| Oslo | 53 | 69 | 64 | 96 |
Why the zenith window is so short
The midday prohibition is the one people most often imagine as a long block, perhaps because some timetables mark several minutes before Dhuhr as a cautionary buffer. The astronomical event itself is brief. Istiwa' is the sun crossing the meridian, and the sun moves across the sky at fifteen degrees of hour angle every hour. Its disc is about half a degree wide, so the whole disc crosses the meridian in roughly two minutes, a little over 2.3 minutes at the solstices.
That figure barely varies with place. The sun's rate of motion across the meridian does not depend on your latitude, only on the season, which is why the same number came out for Makkah, Istanbul, London and Oslo. What does vary is how high the sun stands: 88° in Makkah on 21 June, 15° in London on 21 December. Near noon the altitude changes very slowly, which is why a stick's shadow seems to stall at midday, and why the moment cannot be judged by eye to the minute. That uncertainty, not the length of the event, is the reason for the buffer.
Adhan and most calculators place Dhuhr a moment after the meridian crossing, so in practice the rule is simple: avoid starting a voluntary prayer in the few minutes before the Dhuhr time your prayer times page shows.
The after-Asr stretch: hours, not minutes
Of the five, the period after Asr is the one that actually constrains an ordinary day, because it lasts as long as the Asr window itself. It runs from your Asr prayer to sunset, and its length follows the same two variables we measured in when does each prayer time end: the season, and whether Asr is reckoned by the Shafi'i shadow rule or the later Hanafi one.
In London on 21 June, if you pray Asr as soon as it enters on the Shafi'i reckoning, voluntary prayer is disliked for 3 hours and 57 minutes. In Oslo the same day it is 4 hours and 44 minutes. On the Hanafi reckoning, Asr begins later and the stretch shortens by 74 to 80 minutes, but in Oslo it is still over three hours.
| City | 21 Jun Shafi'i | 21 Jun Hanafi | 21 Dec Shafi'i | 21 Dec Hanafi |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Makkah | 204 | 124 | 141 | 96 |
| Istanbul | 213 | 139 | 138 | 101 |
| London | 237 | 162 | 135 | 106 |
| Oslo | 284 | 205 | 125 | 106 |
What the schools allow inside these times
The prohibition is about voluntary prayer with no particular occasion, and the schools differ on how far it reaches beyond that. These are the broad positions; your own teacher or local mosque may follow a more detailed version.
If you are working out where your own forbidden windows fall today, the prayer times page computes sunrise, Dhuhr and Asr for your coordinates on your device, and why prayer apps differ explains why two apps can put the edge of a window several minutes apart. How long each prayer's own window lasts is in when does each prayer time end; if the window you keep missing is Fajr, see why you keep missing Fajr.
- Shafi'i. Prayers that have a cause are permitted at any of these times: making up a missed obligatory prayer, the funeral prayer, tahiyyat al-masjid on entering a mosque, the prostration of recitation. What is disliked is a voluntary prayer with no cause. The school also exempts the zenith on Friday and prayer within the Haram of Makkah.
- Hanafi. The strictest. At the three moments of sunrise, zenith and sunset no prayer is valid at all, including a make-up of an obligatory prayer; the one exception is that day's own Asr if it is still being prayed as the sun sets. In the two stretches after Fajr and after Asr, voluntary prayer is disliked but make-ups and funeral prayers are permitted.
- Maliki. Voluntary prayer is avoided after Fajr and after Asr and at sunrise and sunset, while missed obligatory prayers may be made up at any time. The school is generally reported not to count the zenith as a disliked time.
- Hanbali. Obligatory make-ups and the funeral prayer are permitted at any time, with some caution about funerals at the three sun moments. Whether prayers with a cause, such as tahiyyat al-masjid, are allowed is disputed within the school; a well-known strand, associated with Ibn Taymiyyah, permits them.
Common questions
- Can I pray sunnah prayers after Asr?
- A voluntary prayer with no particular cause is disliked after you have prayed Asr, until sunset, on all four schools. The Shafi'i school permits prayers with a cause, such as tahiyyat al-masjid; the Hanafi school does not. In London in June that disliked stretch can last almost four hours.
- How many minutes after sunrise can I pray?
- The hadith says until the sun has risen a spear's length, which is not given in minutes. The common rule of thumb is 15 to 20 minutes. We measured the time for the sun to climb to 3.5° and 5°: about 21 to 28 minutes in Makkah, 35 to 52 minutes in London, and up to 96 minutes in Oslo in December.
- How long is the zawal (zenith) time?
- The sun's disc takes about two minutes to cross the meridian — roughly 2.3 minutes at the solstices, almost the same everywhere. Timetables often add a few minutes' buffer before Dhuhr because the moment is hard to judge by eye.
- Can I make up a missed prayer during a forbidden time?
- On the Shafi'i, Maliki and Hanbali positions, yes, at any time. On the Hanafi position, yes after Fajr and after Asr, but not at the moments of sunrise, zenith and sunset themselves.