Times When Prayer Is Discouraged (Makruh Times)

The times most widely cited are: (1) from sunrise until the sun has fully risen above the horizon (roughly the first 10–15 minutes of the day); (2) when the sun is at its exact zenith at midday, until it visibly begins to decline (a very short moment just before Dhuhr); and (3) from when the sun turns yellow and begins to set until it has fully set.

The reasoning transmitted in the traditions is to avoid any resemblance to sun-worship, which historically centred on sunrise and sunset. The prohibition is therefore about the moment of rising, culmination and setting rather than about the prayers themselves.

These windows restrict voluntary (nafl) prayer. Obligatory prayers performed in their proper time are unaffected. Many scholars also make exceptions for prayers with a specific cause — such as making up a missed obligatory prayer, the funeral prayer, or the two units on entering a mosque (tahiyyat al-masjid) — though the rulings on each vary between schools.

For most people this simply means not starting an optional prayer in the very first minutes after sunrise, in the sliver of time right before Dhuhr, or once the sun has begun to set before Maghrib. The windows are short and easy to work around. For the exact boundaries of the five obligatory prayers, see when each prayer starts and ends.