Landmark · Delhi

Jama Masjid, Delhi

In 60 seconds

The Jama Masjid — Masjid-i-Jahan-Numa — is the principal mosque of Shahjahanabad in Old Delhi, India, and one of the largest in the country: its courtyard holds twenty-five thousand people. Shah Jahan laid the foundation on Friday 6 October 1650 and it was finished in 1656, at a cost of a million rupees and the work of some five thousand labourers. It is a working mosque rather than a ticketed monument, which changes everything about visiting it. Delhi Tourism's official page says Indian visitors enter free and foreign visitors pay ₹400 with photography included, from 8 a.m. for foreign visitors and 11 a.m. for Indians, until sunset. In practice the charges are collected by mosque staff at the gate and vary — a camera fee of about ₹300 and about ₹100 for the minaret climb are commonly quoted. Shoes come off, shoulders and knees are covered, and it closes to visitors at every prayer.

Fees & timings

CHECKED AGAINST OFFICIAL SOURCES · AUGUST 2026

Entry — Indian visitors	Free, per Delhi Tourism
Entry — foreign visitors	₹400, per Delhi Tourism — photography included in that figure
Camera	Delhi Tourism says free; staff at the gate commonly ask ≈ ₹300
South minaret	≈ ₹100 · about 130 steps, a tight spiral
Robes	≈ ₹50 to hire, for uncovered shoulders or knees
Hours	Foreign visitors from 08:00; Indian visitors from 11:00; until sunset
Closed to visitors	At every prayer, and through Friday midday

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This is a mosque before it is a sight, and the etiquette is not decorative. Shoes off at the gate; shoulders and knees covered by everyone; women are given a robe. Friday midday belongs to the congregation and visitors are not admitted. The charges are collected by the mosque, not by ASI, and what is asked varies with who is on the gate — which is worth knowing when a camera fee is quoted on top of the entry Delhi Tourism says already includes photography.

The relics in the north gate

In a cabinet at the north gate the mosque keeps a small collection, shown on request: a Quran written on deer skin, a hair from the Prophet's beard, his sandals, and a footprint in stone. A caretaker will open the case, and a tip is expected. Nothing announces any of it — you have to know to ask.

The India Unfolded edit

Four things to look at, that nobody points out

The eastern steps are the emperor's

Three gates, three flights of red sandstone steps. The eastern flight, facing the Red Fort, was reserved for the emperor and his household; visitors now come up the north or the south. Stand at the top of the east steps and you are on the axis Shah Jahan laid out — mosque to fort, in a straight line across the old city.

Striped minarets

The two minarets are 40 metres and five storeys, built in alternating vertical strips of red sandstone and white marble. The southern one is the one visitors climb — about 130 steps and a tight spiral, for the best view of Old Delhi's roofline there is.

The tank is not decoration

The tank in the middle of the courtyard is for ablution before prayer. Wash from it if you are praying. Do not put your feet in it if you are not — a rule nobody posts and everybody notices being broken.

Nothing here is empty

The courtyard is not a monument floor. Between prayers people sleep on it, children run across it, families eat on it, pigeon-sellers work its corners. It has been the living room of the walled city for three and a half centuries, and behaving like a guest in someone's living room is the whole of the etiquette.

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