Ramadan is the month when a rate plan built on ordinary weeks stops describing your guests, and the change runs in opposite directions depending on the city. A host near the Grand Mosque is pricing the busiest stretch of the Umrah year. A host in Riyadh or Jeddah is pricing a month in which the day moves into the evening and many residents travel themselves. This guide covers both, using the dates in the JokerPrice events calendar and the settings JokerPrice actually has.
Start with dates you can trust
Ramadan follows the Hijri calendar, so it arrives roughly eleven days earlier each Gregorian year, and last year's rate plan will put Ramadan prices on the wrong nights. The start and the end are confirmed by the Supreme Court after the moon sighting. Until that announcement, a date computed from the Umm al-Qura calendar is a good working date but not a certain one, which is why JokerPrice labels it expected.
For 2027 the calendar places Ramadan 1448 on , the last ten nights on and the Eid al-Fitr holiday on . For comparison, Ramadan 1447 ran .
The nights most likely to move are the first night and the last one or two, so avoid locking a long minimum stay or a fixed peak price onto them until the announcement.
| Event | Dates | Hijri dates | Where | Certainty | Source |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Ramadan 1447 | 1–30 Ramadan 1447 AH | All of Saudi Arabia | official dates | uqn.gov.sa | |
| Ramadan 1448 | 1–29 Ramadan 1448 AH | All of Saudi Arabia | expected dates, may move | ummulqura.org.sa | |
| Founding Day school break | — | All of Saudi Arabia | expected dates, may move | al-madina.com | |
| Founding Day | — | All of Saudi Arabia | official dates | hrsd.gov.sa | |
| Eid al-Fitr school break | — | All of Saudi Arabia | expected dates, may move | al-madina.com | |
| Last ten nights of Ramadan | 21–29 Ramadan 1448 AH | Makkah, Madinah | expected dates, may move | ummulqura.org.sa | |
| Eid al-Fitr holiday | 1–4 Shawwal 1448 AH | All of Saudi Arabia | expected dates, may move | haj.gov.sa |
Makkah and Madinah: a season that peaks at the end
In the holy cities Ramadan is the heart of the Umrah year, and the calendar marks 21–30 Ramadan as the peak period in both. Most guests come for worship, so walking distance to the Grand Mosque or the Prophet's Mosque counts for more than at any other time. So does the length of stay: a guest who plans around the last ten nights is buying a block of nights, not a weekend.
- Treat the last ten nights as their own season. In JokerPrice they are a separate event from Ramadan itself, so they can carry their own adjustment and minimum stay. When two enabled events cover the same night, the plan applies the single adjustment with the largest size rather than adding them together. Set the last-ten-nights adjustment as the full uplift you want, not as a top-up on the Ramadan one.
- Price the first twenty nights from the market, not from the peak. The early weeks of Ramadan and the last ten nights are different products. Refresh the pricing calendar so those nights have fresh comparables of your type and size, and read what nearby listings ask for those exact dates.
- Know who can travel. The Ministry of Hajj and Umrah's Umrah season calendar for 1448 keeps Umrah visas open until 1 Shawwal 1448, so Ramadan 1448 falls inside the season for pilgrims from abroad as well as from home. The Ministry of Education's Eid al-Fitr school break runs , which covers all of the last ten nights, so families with school-age children are free to travel for them.
A long minimum stay protects the peak from short bookings, but if the month ends a day early, or a guest wants seven of the ten nights, a rigid ten-night minimum can leave the whole block empty. One way to balance this is a firm minimum while the nights are far out, relaxed close to the date if gaps appear. The guide to orphan nights and minimum stays shows how.
Riyadh and Jeddah: the shape of demand changes
Outside the holy cities there is no single Ramadan pattern you can safely assume, because two forces pull in opposite directions. The day shifts toward iftar, the evening and suhoor, which suits properties that host gatherings, such as chalets and rest houses on the edge of the city. At the same time, some residents leave for Umrah during the last ten nights and many families travel for Eid, which can soften demand for city apartments at the end of the month. Which force wins depends on your district, your property type and the year, so measure it rather than guess:
- Open supply. For properties priced against Gathern, JokerPrice compares the number of matching listings still open on each date with the usual count. Fewer open listings than usual means the market is filling and the rate is nudged up; more means it is not. Airbnb and Agoda report no reliable totals, so this signal is skipped for them.
- The night's own comparables. The weekday pattern JokerPrice learns comes from the whole coming year, so it knows nothing special about Ramadan. On Ramadan nights, rely on fresh comparables for those exact dates, or on your own rule.
- Observed impact. City calendar pages such as Riyadh and Jeddah compare occupancy and booked rates during past events with the four weeks before them, once enough tracked nights exist. Tracking began in late October 2026, so Ramadan 1448 will be the first Ramadan JokerPrice can measure. Until then those rows say collecting.
Before you decide where to sit, read how asking rates spread by bedroom count in the Riyadh and Jeddah market reports, and in the Makkah and Madinah reports if your property is in the holy cities.
Setting it up in JokerPrice
- Event rules are off by default. In the pricing calendar, switch on Ramadan 1448 and, for a property in Makkah or Madinah, the last ten nights. Each takes an adjustment from −30% to +100% and an optional minimum stay of 1 to 30 nights, as the events calendar describes.
- An event adjusts only open nights without a fixed price, inside its dates, for properties in a city the event lists. The last-ten-nights entry lists only Makkah and Madinah, so it never touches a Riyadh property.
- A custom date rule on the same night takes precedence over an event rule, and fixed nightly prices and closed nights are never changed.
- Each affected night names the event, whether its dates are official or expected, and the source. When the Supreme Court announces the dates, the calendar is updated.
- Everything still respects your minimum and maximum. A maximum set for ordinary weeks will cap the last ten nights, so review it first, as the guide to base, minimum and maximum prices explains.
Checklist
- Check the dates on the events calendar now, and again after the moon-sighting announcement.
- Split the month into three: the first twenty nights, the last ten nights and Eid.
- Decide the minimum stay for the last ten nights before you open them for sale, and decide in advance when you will relax it.
- Raise your maximum if it was set for ordinary weeks.
- Refresh the pricing calendar so Ramadan nights have fresh comparables, and read the supply signal before raising rates in Riyadh or Jeddah.
- Export the plan and update your listing; nothing changes on the platform until you do.