Umrah Index exists because planning a self-booked Umrah means making expensive decisions on bad information.
Hotel booking sites tell you a property is “500m from Masjid al-Haram” — a straight line that ignores the fact you will walk twice that far around the Jabal Omar complex to reach a gate. Package sellers quote all-in prices with no breakdown. Visa guidance published in 2023 is still ranking in 2026, and the rules have changed twice since. Meanwhile a family of four is committing to five figures.
We built a research desk to fix the parts of that we can actually fix: what things cost, how far they are, and what the current rules say.
What we do
We track prices. Every week we log nightly rates for the hotels we cover in Makkah and Madinah, across fixed future date windows. Over time this tells you something a single search never can — whether the price you are being shown is normal, high, or a genuine deal.
We measure distances. We map each hotel to its walking route and its Haram gate, not its straight-line distance.
We verify policies directly. When a hotel’s family-room rules, shuttle service or check-in policy matters to a booking decision, we contact the hotel and ask, and we tell you when we asked.
We date everything. Every page shows when its figures were last checked. If it is stale, you will know.
What we don’t do
- We don’t sell Umrah packages and we are not a travel agency. We have no packages to steer you toward.
- We don’t issue religious rulings. Where we describe the rites, we summarise and cite recognised scholarly sources and link you to them. For anything requiring a ruling, ask a qualified scholar — not a website.
- We don’t write about experiences we haven’t had. You will never read a fabricated first-person account on this site. When we describe something, we tell you how we know it.
Who publishes this
Umrah Index is published by Noureddine Bachoud, based in Agadir, Morocco.
Articles are published under the Umrah Index Research Desk byline because they are the product of tracked data and verification work rather than one person’s travel diary. Where an individual contributor’s first-hand experience informs a page, we name them on that page.
Questions, corrections and hotel enquiries: hello@umrahindex.com
How we’re funded
Reader bookings. When you book a hotel or service through a link on this site, we may earn a commission at no additional cost to you. That is the entire business model — no sponsored placements, no paid inclusion, no packages. Our affiliate disclosure and editorial policy explain exactly how we keep that separate from what we recommend.
Corrections
If something here is wrong, tell us and we will fix it and note the change. Email hello@umrahindex.com — corrections get priority over everything else in the inbox.