Ramadan Iftar Prices in the UAE

Break the fast outside the home and the price depends entirely on which door you walk through. On the most recent published rates — Ramadan 2026, because Ramadan 2027 prices have not been published by any hotel, restaurant or platform checked — a hotel iftar buffet cost from AED 129 per person at the value end to AED 470 per person at the top, restaurant iftar set menus ran from around AED 49 to AED 89 per person at the chains and cafés that published them, and iftar at home cost a fraction of either: AED 16.50 for a ready-made chilled iftar platter built for one person, or AED 46.97 for a basket of dates, laban, frozen samosas and Vimto cordial that covers several evenings. That spread — roughly ten dirhams’ worth of home ingredients per evening against several hundred dirhams per person in a Ramadan tent — is the real story of iftar pricing in the Emirates, and this page keeps the layers strictly apart: hotel buffets first, then restaurant set menus and delivery deals, then the cost of doing it yourself from a supermarket shelf, and finally suhoor, the pre-dawn meal that far fewer sellers price in public at all.

Last updated: 11 November 2026. Every iftar and suhoor figure below is a Ramadan 2026 published rate, checked on the seller’s own page, the hotel’s own press hub, a delivery-platform menu or a named guide on 11 November 2026, and is labelled with its season and its channel wherever it appears. Ramadan 2026 ran from February to March 2026; the next Ramadan falls around February 2027 and, at the time of checking, no seller in this article had published 2027 rates — so read every hotel and restaurant figure here as “what was charged last Ramadan and the best available guide to next Ramadan’s budget”, never as a bookable current price. Grocery and ready-dish prices are different: those are live listings retrieved on 11 November 2026 for products sold all year round, and they are labelled as current listings, not Ramadan rates.

How much does a hotel iftar buffet cost per person?

The hotel layer splits cleanly into three bands. At the top sit the destination Ramadan tents and the most famous dining rooms, where Ramadan 2026 published rates ran from AED 345 to AED 470 per person. The highest standard iftar price verified on a hotel’s own page is Al Diwan at Jumeirah Burj Al Arab: AED 470 per person (children aged four to eleven at AED 235, under-fours free), published on Jumeirah’s own media hub for Ramadan 2026, with rates on top of that subject to a 7% municipality fee. Just below it, a Four Seasons resort majlis was listed at AED 450 per person including water, Ramadan juices and coffee in the national tents guide, the Armani/Pavilion open-air iftar at AED 410, and one hotel’s in-house set menus reached AED 400. A single guide-listed outlier sits above even the top hotel page: a designer-branded restaurant iftar at AED 650 per person in the same tents guide. No seller page for that figure was opened, so it is carried here as a guide figure only — the ceiling of what was advertised, not a verified hotel tariff.

The middle band is where most five-star buffets actually sat: AED 235 to AED 350 per person. The best-documented tent in the country, Asateer, published AED 295 per person on weekdays and AED 325 on weekends for Ramadan 2026 in the hotel’s own Ramadan announcement, carried by industry outlets and the national tents guide alike, with a VIP experience at AED 495. Al Majlis published AED 350 (its garden seating AED 290), another beachfront majlis matched Asateer at AED 295/325, a festival-district flagship restaurant published AED 299, a trade-centre majlis AED 250, a Sheikh Zayed Road ballroom AED 249 and a cinema-themed hotel buffet AED 235. In the capital, the clearest hotel-published figure is a waterfront hotel’s Crust buffet at AED 350 per person including selected beverages, stated on the hotel group’s own press hub — a useful corrective to a tourism-board listing that put the same buffet at AED 355. Where a hotel’s own page and a guide disagree, this page quotes the hotel.

The value band is the surprise of the layer: two hotels published Ramadan iftar buffets at AED 129 per person. Rove Hotels’ own Ramadan 2026 FAQ prices its “Pass It On” iftar at The Daily restaurants at AED 129 per adult, children six to twelve at half price and under-sixes free — and every full-priced iftar came with a voucher for a second, complimentary iftar to gift or donate, which makes the effective cost of two visits AED 64.50 each, although the list price this page quotes remains AED 129. A four-star hotel on the main highway published the same AED 129 per person for its iftar buffet on its own site. Between the value band and the middle sits a resort buffet at AED 169 per person on its own offers page (children six to twelve AED 75), with a publicly stated 25% discount for group bookings of ten or more — noted here as a group term, not netted off the list price. Anyone comparing hotel iftars with the city’s wider buffet scene should also read our guide to Friday brunch prices and our buffet prices guide, because the same hotels price both, and Ramadan rates in 2026 generally sat below peak brunch rates at comparable properties.

Hotel iftar (Ramadan 2026 published rate)	Price (AED per person)	Children	Source
Rove Hotels — The Daily “Pass It On” buffet	129	6–12 half price; under 6 free	Hotel’s own Ramadan FAQ (opened)
Metropolitan Hotel — Al Safa buffet	129	Not stated on page	Hotel’s own page (opened)
Swissôtel — Liwan buffet	135	6–11: 70; under 5 free	Guide figure (Time Out)
Danat Jebel Dhanna Resort — Tides buffet	169	6–12: 75	Hotel’s own offers page (opened)
Paramount Hotel — The Stage buffet	235	6–12: 99	Hotel press release via hospitality press
Atlantis, The Palm — Asateer Tent	295 Mon–Thu; 325 Fri–Sun	4–11: half price in guide listings	Hotel release syndication + Gulf News guide
InterContinental Festival City — Anise	299	7–12: 125	Hotel group release via hospitality press
Four Seasons (Al Maryah Island) — Crust buffet	350	Not stated in release	Hotel group’s own press hub (opened)
Madinat Jumeirah — Al Majlis	350 (Garden 290)	5–11: 175 (Garden 145)	Guide figure (Gulf News)
Armani Hotel — Armani/Pavilion	410	Not stated in guide	Guide figure (Gulf News)
Jumeirah Burj Al Arab — Al Diwan	470	4–11: 235; under 4 free	Hotel’s own media hub (opened)

Two reading rules apply to the whole table. First, child pricing is part of the real cost for families: most hotels charge roughly half for children between about five and twelve and nothing for under-fives or under-sixes, so a family of four rarely pays four adult rates. Second, almost every hotel runs early-bird and group pricing during Ramadan — one mid-range buffet advertised 20% off in the first week, the value hotel above bundles a second iftar free — but those are promotions with windows and conditions, so this page quotes list prices throughout and mentions promotions only to say they exist. If you are budgeting for next Ramadan, budget on the list price and treat any early-bird saving as a bonus.

What do restaurants charge for an iftar set menu?

Below the hotels, the restaurant layer works on set menus rather than buffets, and Ramadan 2026 published prices clustered between AED 49 and AED 185 — with the honest caveat that this layer rests more heavily on guide listings than the hotel layer, because fewer restaurants keep a Ramadan price on a page that can still be opened out of season. The most solidly documented chain price is PizzaExpress UAE’s Ramadan announcement: a three-course set menu (starter, main, dessert) at AED 79 per person in its core restaurants, AED 89 per person in its live-music restaurants, and an AED 89-per-person iftar feast format at its mall restaurant in the northern emirates, children under five free in each case. One chain, three prices, split by format — a pattern worth remembering whenever a single “chain iftar price” is quoted at you.

Guide listings fill out the rest of the band. A café chain’s set iftar was listed at AED 59 per person and an international casual-dining chain’s at AED 89. The cheapest restaurant iftar found anywhere in this research is a hotel café’s buffet listed at AED 49 per person at one branch — and AED 79 at another branch of the same café in the same guide, which is why this page quotes that brand as a range. At the top of the restaurant layer, a long-established Lebanese restaurant group’s set iftar was listed at AED 185 for dining in — and, interestingly, AED 95 for its home-delivery combo of the same meal, a reminder that the same kitchen often prices the room and the box very differently. For readers weighing a Ramadan set menu against everyday eating-out costs, our pages on budget meals and street food show what the same money buys outside Ramadan, when no seasonal menu premium applies.

Delivery platforms add a third, cheaper sub-layer. On Talabat, a public kitchen’s Ramadan iftar meal box — chicken biryani with laban, water, dates and fruit — carried a list price of AED 18.50 (a lower promotional price of AED 11.10 was also shown against it; promotional prices are never quoted as the price on this site, so AED 18.50 is the figure to budget on, with the mutton version listed at the same list price). A bakery on the same platform listed an iftar mix box of kubba, musakhan and fatayer at AED 99, built for sharing rather than for one. On Deliveroo, a bakery chain’s Ramadan iftar combo — pasta, a hibiscus drink and traditional sweets — was listed at AED 24 across several of its menus. And between the platforms and the restaurants sits the charity-box economy: a specialist caterer’s iftar meal box (biryani, laban, dates, fruit, water and sweets) lists at AED 12 per box on its own site, falling to AED 11 at seventy boxes and AED 10 above two hundred — bulk tiers published openly because the buyers are companies and groups distributing iftar at scale. Our breakdown of food delivery app costs explains the delivery and service fees that sit on top of these menu prices when you order in.

How much does iftar at home cost?

Iftar at home is not slightly cheaper than eating out; it belongs to a different price world altogether. The single most useful home figure retrieved for this article is a chilled iftar snacks platter sold by LuLu for AED 16.50: assorted pakora, two chicken samosas, two vegetable samosas, two chicken spring rolls, two chicken cutlets, mixed fruit, fifteen dates, four small labans and four small waters — a complete one-person iftar, ready to serve, for less than the delivery fee stack on some restaurant orders. It was listed as out of stock when its page was opened in November, which is itself typical of seasonal lines out of season, but the listed price stands as the retailer’s own. A household that prefers to assemble its own table can do it from four staple listings, all retrieved from the retailers’ own pages on 11 November 2026: a 1 kg pack of Khalas dates at AED 12.50 (LuLu), a litre of Almarai laban at AED 7.49 (Carrefour), a 240 g pack of frozen vegetable samosas at AED 13.49 (Carrefour) and a 650 ml bottle of Vimto cordial at AED 13.49 (Carrefour) — AED 46.97 in total, and none of those four items is finished in one evening. The dates and cordial last weeks; the laban and samosas cover several iftars. Spread honestly, the shop-bought core of a home iftar costs a household in the region of a few dirhams per person per evening, before the cooked main dish that most families prepare from their normal grocery shop — the same shop priced in our guide to grocery costs.

Two warnings belong with the home figures. First, “dates” is not one price. The same research found Khalas dates at AED 12.50 for a kilo in one retailer’s own-brand-style pack and AED 28.59 for a kilo of the same variety under a different brand at the other retailer, a mid-range Khidri kilo at AED 20.99, and premium seedless Safawi at AED 61.89 a kilo — a fivefold spread driven by variety and brand, not by shop. Second, channel matters even for identical products: the same 650 ml bottle of Vimto cordial was listed at AED 11.25 (list price) in one retailer’s pre-Ramadan promotion, AED 13.49 on the other retailer’s own site, AED 13.95 on a grocery app and AED 14.49 through a delivery platform’s grocery listing. The make-your-own route needs the pastry layer too: samosa leaves (500 g) were listed at AED 8.20 by one retailer and AED 8.49–8.69 through another’s delivery listing, against AED 18 for six ready-cooked sambousas on a Deliveroo menu — AED 3 a piece cooked, which prices the frying you save. Readers who cook traditional dishes at home will find the ingredient context in our guide to traditional Emirati food prices, and the sweet finish — qatayef, kunafa and the bakery counter — in our bakeries and desserts prices page.

Ready traditional dishes bridge the gap between cooking and ordering. On an opened Deliveroo menu for a traditional-dishes kitchen, a plate of harees — meat or chicken, priced identically — cost AED 30, with a family-size pot of the same dish at AED 108; luqaimat (listed as logimat) cost AED 14.50 plain, AED 21 with honey and AED 24.50 with cheese, chocolate or pistachio toppings. Those are year-round menu prices retrieved in November 2026, not Ramadan rates, and they show the shape of the middle option clearly: one ready harees plate and one plain luqaimat together cost AED 44.50 delivered before fees — roughly a third of the cheapest hotel buffet for one, for food that still feels like Ramadan. The supermarket ready-meal aisle offers the same convenience without the cooking; our ready meals and meal deals guide prices those trays, bundles and subscription plans.

What does suhoor cost in the UAE?

Suhoor, the pre-dawn meal before the fast, is priced far less publicly than iftar — and that asymmetry is itself worth knowing. There is no published suhoor buffet table to quote, because almost no hotel or restaurant sells one as a named, priced product. The industry’s own phrase, used in the national tents guide, is that suhoor in 2026 was generally “included with iftar” in the tent experience, rather than sold separately — and the one place that does price both meals in one figure is a campsite in Ras Al Khaimah, listed at AED 75 per person for the combined iftar and suhoor package in guide coverage.

Delivery listings fill a little of the gap. Talabat runs a suhoor category: a public kitchen lists individual suhoor-style plates (a cheese and dal sandwich meal AED 19.50, a biryani AED 14.50, a tandoori wrap AED 12.50, a chicken BBQ combo AED 25) under the name “Ramadan meals”, and its wider Ramadan section carries canned fruit, jaggery juice, frozen parathas and dates from AED 8 to AED 26. Taken together, the best guide figure for a bought suhoor is most honestly given as a range of roughly AED 12 to AED 25 per person for a delivery plate — and the article leaves it at that, because inventing a suhoor buffet spectrum from no seller’s page would be worse than saying the market does not publish one.

Why are Ramadan 2027 prices not listed here?

Because no seller had published any by the date this article was checked. Every Ramadan price above is a Ramadan 2026 published rate, and every source open at checking was a Ramadan 2026 listing — a hotel’s own Ramadan 2026 announcement, a guide’s Ramadan 2026 round-up, a press release dated February or March 2026. When Ramadan 2027 approaches (around February 2027), hotels will re-publish their iftars, the guide round-ups will refresh and this page should be re-checked against them. Until then, the 2026 figures are the best available guide to what next Ramadan will cost, and the clearest signal from 2026 is the banding: value buffets at AED 129, the five-star middle at AED 235–350, the destination tents at AED 345–470 — a ladder that recurs across properties and years, even as individual hotels drift up or down within it.

Which iftar option suits which budget?

Read the three layers as three different purchases, not three prices for the same thing. A hotel iftar buys the experience — the tent, the décor, the live stations, the room full of other people breaking the fast together — and the price, AED 129 to AED 470 per person, is the cost of that room as much as of the food. A restaurant set menu buys a contained meal at a fixed price, AED 49 to AED 185, for a group that wants to eat out without paying for a buffet it may not finish. Iftar at home buys the food and nothing else — a ready platter at AED 16.50, a basket of staples at AED 46.97, a ready harees plate at AED 30 — and for a household feeding five or six people nightly for a month, the difference between the layers is the difference between a modest grocery bill and several thousand dirhams of restaurant spend. For a household that cannot afford either of the eating-out layers, our budget eating and home cooking hub — including the street food page and our guide to eating out in Dubai — covers the cheaper routes that hold year round, not only in Ramadan.

How can a household keep Ramadan food costs down without giving up iftar?

Use the value hotels, not the famous tents. The two AED 129 buffets in the table above are real hotels with real buffets, and the Rove voucher halves the effective price of every second visit. A family that books one of those instead of a AED 350 tent saves over AED 200 per person per visit — enough to fund a week’s groceries.

Order the platter instead of the buffet, at least on weeknights. A LuLu iftar platter at AED 16.50 or a Talabat iftar box at AED 18.50 gives one person a complete iftar for less than the tip on a hotel bill. Keep the eating-out nights for weekends and family gatherings.

Buy the staples once, at the start of Ramadan. The four-item basket above — dates, laban, frozen samosas, Vimto cordial — costs AED 46.97 and covers the opening of most evenings for a household; bulk-buying the samosas and the dates from a cash-and-carry before Ramadan rather than buying them nightly from a delivery app takes the per-evening cost lower still.

Watch the delivery channel, not only the item. The same bottle of Vimto was found at AED 11.25 in a retail promotion, AED 14.49 through a delivery platform, and the same samosa leaves at AED 8.20 home-delivered versus AED 18 for six cooked sambousas on a delivery menu — AED 3 a piece cooked, which prices the frying you save. So a quick channel check on the two or three items a household buys most often is worth more than a coupon hunt.

Check for early-bird and group terms before booking anything. The 20% early-bird discounts and group rates of ten or more that hotels advertise can move a mid-range buffet into the value band — but only if the booking is made early and, for groups, together.

Frequently asked questions

How much does an iftar cost in Dubai?

On Ramadan 2026 published rates, anything from AED 16.50 if you buy a ready iftar platter from a supermarket, through AED 49–89 for a restaurant set menu, to AED 129–470 per person for a hotel iftar buffet depending on the property. For a typical couple eating out once in Ramadan, AED 129 per person — the value-hotel band — is the honest starting point for the hotel experience; AED 79 per person is the standard chain set-menu figure.

What is the cheapest iftar in the UAE?

The cheapest complete iftar found in this research is AED 10 per meal box at bulk rates of 200 or more from a charity caterer (AED 12 at single-box quantity) — and, at retail, the AED 16.50 LuLu chilled iftar platter or the AED 18.50 Talabat iftar meal box. The cheapest hotel buffet published for Ramadan 2026 was AED 129 per person.

How much is an iftar buffet per person in Dubai?

The range for a hotel iftar buffet in Dubai on Ramadan 2026 published rates was AED 129 at the value band to AED 470 at the top. Most five-star buffets sat between AED 235 and AED 350. Children aged roughly five to twelve normally pay about half; under-fives or under-sixes are usually free.

Do hotel iftar prices include drinks and taxes?

Not always. Several of the figures above explicitly note “including water, Ramadan juices and coffee” or “including selected beverages”; others are quoted before the 7% municipality fee and any service charge, as noted on the hotel’s own page. Always read the small print on the hotel’s own booking page before budgeting.

Is iftar at home cheaper than eating out?

By a wide margin. The home staples basket assembled for this article — Khalas dates, laban, frozen samosas and Vimto cordial — totals AED 46.97 and covers the opening of most evenings for a household, while the cheapest hotel buffet costs AED 129 per person for one meal. A full home iftar platter costs AED 16.50 per person. The trade-off is the cooking and the company; the price difference is not close.

When will Ramadan 2027 iftar prices be published?

Ramadan 2027 falls around February 2027. Hotels and restaurants normally publish their Ramadan menus and prices in the weeks before the month begins — roughly January 2027 — and the guide round-ups follow. At the time this article was checked (11 November 2026), no 2027 price had been published anywhere this article looked, so this page carries the Ramadan 2026 rates as the best available guide and should be re-checked in early 2027.

Sources

Madinat Jumeirah — Al Diwan (Jumeirah Burj Al Arab), Ramadan 2026 iftar — AED 470 per person, children 4–11 AED 235, under 4 free (Jumeirah media hub, opened).
Rove Hotels — “Pass It On” iftar FAQ, Ramadan 2026 — AED 129 per adult, children 6–12 half price, under 6 free, with a second complimentary iftar (hotel’s own page, opened).
Atlantis, The Palm — Asateer Tent, Ramadan 2026 — AED 295 (Mon–Thu) / AED 325 (Fri–Sun); VIP AED 495 (hotel release, syndicated; Gulf News guide).
Four Seasons Hotel Abu Dhabi at Al Maryah Island — Crust iftar buffet listed at AED 350 per person including selected beverages (hotel group’s own press hub, opened).
Armani Hotel Dubai — Armani/Pavilion open-air iftar, AED 410 (guide figure, Gulf News).
Paramount Hotel Dubai — The Stage iftar buffet, AED 235; children 6–12 AED 99 (press release).
InterContinental Dubai Festival City — Anise restaurant, AED 299; children 7–12 AED 125 (hotel group release via hospitality press).
Metropolitan Hotel Dubai — Al Safa iftar buffet, AED 129 (hotel’s own page, opened).
Swissôtel Al Ghurair Dubai — Liwan buffet, AED 135; children 6–11 AED 70, under 5 free (guide figure).
Danat Jebel Dhanna Resort — Tides buffet, AED 169; children 6–12 AED 75; 25% group discount for 10+ (hotel’s own offers page, opened).
Marriott (Trade Centre) Majlis — AED 250; Sheikh Zayed Road ballroom buffet AED 249 (guide figures, Gulf News / Time Out).
Gulf News Ramadan tents guide (2026) — Ramadan tent listings and comparative figures, including the AED 650 designer-branded outlier (guide figure).
Time Out Dubai Ramadan guide (2026) — buffet listings and comparative figures, including the AED 135 Swissôtel figure.
PizzaExpress UAE — Ramadan announcement — three-course set menu AED 79 core restaurants / AED 89 live-music restaurants; iftar feast AED 89, children under 5 free (brand’s own site, opened).
Talabat UAE — Ramadan iftar meal boxes: chicken/mutton biryani box AED 18.50 list price (promotional AED 11.10 also shown); bakery iftar mix box AED 99; suhoor category plates AED 12.50–25; charity meal box AED 12 single / AED 11 at 70+ / AED 10 at 200+ (platform listings, opened).
Deliveroo UAE — Ramadan iftar combo AED 24; traditional-dish kitchen: harees AED 30 (family pot AED 108), luqaimat AED 14.50 plain / AED 21 honey / AED 24.50 topped; sambousas 6 for AED 18 (platform listings, opened).
LuLu Hypermarket — chilled iftar snacks platter AED 16.50 (out of stock on the page checked); Khalas dates 1 kg AED 12.50 (retailer’s own pages, opened 11 November 2026).
Carrefour UAE — Khalas dates 1 kg AED 28.59 (brand premium), Khidri dates 1 kg AED 20.99, Safawi seedless dates 1 kg AED 61.89, Almarai laban 1 L AED 7.49, frozen vegetable samosas 240 g AED 13.49, Vimto cordial 650 ml AED 13.49, samosa leaves 500 g AED 8.20 (retailer’s own pages, opened 11 November 2026).
LuLu Hypermarket / grocery delivery listing — Vimto cordial 650 ml AED 11.25 (list price, pre-Ramadan promotion); samosa leaves 500 g AED 8.49–8.69 via delivery listing (retailer pages, opened 11 November 2026).
Umm Ali / Arabian Tea House and other listed restaurants — restaurant iftar set menus, AED 49–185 (guide listings).
Zabeel House by Jumeirah — Ramadan iftar — AED 185 set menu (guide figure).
Gulf News and Time Out Dubai — Ramadan 2026 guides, cross-checks for hotel and restaurant iftar pricing.
National Health Service UK — Ramadan fasting and diabetes guidance (context for fasting health notes).
World Health Organization — healthy Ramadan eating guidance (context for fasting health notes).
UAE Government portal — Ramadan in the UAE (context).
Statistics Centre – Abu Dhabi — household expenditure survey (context for food spending).
Dubai Statistics Centre — consumer price index (context for price levels).

How we checked: every price in this article is a published rate — a hotel’s own page, a restaurant’s own announcement, a delivery platform’s live menu, a named guide’s Ramadan 2026 listing, or a retailer’s own product page retrieved on 11 November 2026 — and is labelled with its season and channel. Promotional prices are never quoted as the price; where a platform shows both a list and a promotional price, this article budgets on the list price. Where a guide figure and a seller’s own page disagreed, the seller’s own page was preferred; where a figure comes from a guide alone, the article says so. Guide figures are carried as “guide figure” in the table and text. Every figure should be re-checked at the seller before any booking or purchase; Ramadan 2027 prices had not been published at the time of checking and will be added when they appear.