The finder on this page starts from a Dallas, Texas preset. From that point, the initial bearing toward the Kaaba in Makkah is 43.5° from true north, just north of northeast. If you are elsewhere in Dallas or the wider DFW area, use your device location, coordinates or the map to get a bearing for your own spot. Select Use the city centre again to return to the Dallas preset.
Choose Dallas or your own point in the DFW area
The Dallas preset uses 32.7767, -96.7970, an approximate reference point within the City of Dallas. It gives a city-level answer. For a home, hotel, campus or workplace elsewhere in Dallas or the DFW area, set your actual point in one of these ways:
- Select Use my location for a one-time device fix. The result calculates automatically.
- Open Enter coordinates instead. Type Latitude first and Longitude second in decimal degrees, then select Find my Qibla. Longitudes west of Greenwich are negative, so every DFW-area longitude starts with a minus sign.
- Select Open map, pan to the place and select Use map centre. Panning alone does not change the origin.
Search city presets lists 107 city presets. It does not look up street addresses, so for a specific address use coordinates, the map or a device fix.
Each new origin gets its own result. For example, the FAA publishes a single reference point for Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport, which rounds to 32.8972, -97.0377. Enter 32.8972 under Latitude and -97.0377 under Longitude, then select Find my Qibla. The result is 43.3° from true north and about 12,436 km on the finder’s sphere, about 0.2° from the Dallas reference.
That published point is one location on a large airport. If you are travelling through DFW, set your actual terminal or gate position instead.
Read the Dallas direction and compare it with Houston
A bearing of 43.5° is an angle measured clockwise from true north, where north is 0° and east is 90°. Northeast is exactly 45°, so the Dallas direction is northeast, about 1.5° toward north from the diagonal. The 12,430 km figure is an estimated surface distance on a sphere, not a road or flight distance.
The comparison above shows Dallas beside Houston, whose reference bearing is 45.5°. The gap of about 2.0° comes from Houston’s different starting point, so there is no single Qibla heading for all of Texas.
To see the line around you, select Open map. Nearby draws up to 3 km of the initial route on a north-up map, so you can match it to streets and buildings. Full route shows the whole path at global scale.
On a Mercator world map, this shortest route appears as a curve. A straight line drawn between Dallas and Makkah on that map traces a different, longer route. Google’s Qibla Finder help describes the same great-circle idea, and our guide to why Qibla routes curve on maps explains the curve.
Apply the bearing with the right north reference
The 43.5° result is measured from true north. Getting the number needs no heading sensor. Turning it into a direction depends on what you use:
- The map or a known reference: line the bearing up with streets and buildings on the Nearby map, or with a reliable true-north reference.
- A magnetic compass: if it is already set to true north, use 43.5° unchanged. If it is unadjusted, correct once for the current local declination, which you can look up for your date and location with NOAA’s magnetic declination tools. Counting east declination as positive, set the dial to 43.5° minus the declination, wrapped to 0–360°.
- Enable live compass: optional, and available when the device supplies supported magnetic data and the finder’s built-in correction is valid. The finder applies that correction itself, so do not adjust the reading again. Hold the phone in portrait with the screen flat or nearly level, because guidance pauses beyond about 5° of tilt. Select Stop compass when you are done.
Allowing location gives the finder a position, not a compass heading. For more help, see using a separate compass, the north reference notes in the methodology, and what to do when the live compass is not working.
Save the Dallas reference or the point you selected
Some outputs stay fixed. Others follow whichever point is active in the finder.
- Download reference card and the reference panel at the top of the page always show the Dallas reference. The comparison diagram always shows the two fixed references for Dallas and Houston. None of these change when you select another point.
- Printable reference uses the active point and prints its coordinates even with the QR code turned off. Adding a coordinate QR code needs a separate confirmation.
- Share city carries only the selected catalogue city and country, such as Dallas, United States. It is unavailable after you type coordinates, use the map or use a device fix, until you choose a preset again.
- Share location previews the active point. Create coordinate link then encodes its coordinates, its label and any positive uncertainty radius attached to that point, not only one you typed.
To keep a point you entered, such as your terminal position at DFW, use Share location or Printable reference. A link you copied earlier always keeps the point it was created with. Select Use the city centre again to bring the finder back to Dallas. Before forwarding a coordinate link, read how sharing handles your coordinates.