Ramadan 2027 Saudi Arabia Retail Playbook: 12 Weeks to Get Ready

Ramadan 2027 in Saudi Arabia (Ramadan 1448 AH) is expected to start on Monday 8 February 2027, according to the official Umm al-Qura calendar, with Eid al-Fitr on Tuesday 9 March 2027. The calendar itself notes that occasions can shift by one day with the actual moon sighting, so build your retail plan around Eid on 9 or 10 March.

This year's season is a packed one for shops, restaurants and cafés, because its key dates arrive within about five weeks:

• Monday 1 February 2027: deadline for businesses in Wave 25 to integrate with FATOORA, one week before Ramadan.
• Monday 8 February: expected first day of Ramadan.
• Monday 22 February: Founding Day, which falls on 15 Ramadan. Royal Order A/371 made 22 February an official holiday every year.
• Around Sunday 28 February: the last ten days begin, the peak for Eid clothes, gifts and sweets.
• Tuesday 9 or Wednesday 10 March: Eid al-Fitr.

Founding Day in mid-Ramadan creates a double season: busy Ramadan nights with a national day in the middle, when businesses run promotions and families go out. A shop that stocks and rosters for Ramadan alone reaches mid-month short of goods and staff.

Ramadan also arrives ten days earlier on the Gregorian calendar than last year: Ramadan 1447 began on 18 February 2026 in the Umm al-Qura calendar. So don't compare February with February; compare Ramadan with Ramadan, and Eid with Eid.

Your countdown starts on Monday 16 November 2026: from that day to 7 February 2027 is exactly twelve weeks, followed by Ramadan and then Eid.

The first six weeks are about numbers: what you sold last Ramadan, how much you need this year, and who will deliver it before February.

Weeks 12 to 10 (16 November to 6 December): forecast stock from last Ramadan's sales

• Pull sales for Ramadan 1447 and Eid week by product and day. In Odoo, Point of Sale ‣ Reporting ‣ Orders shows them in a pivot or graph view; filter on the season's dates and group by product and by day.
• Split the month into three periods, each with its own basket: the first ten days, the middle (which now includes Founding Day) and the last ten days with Eid.
• Find the days when items ran out. Zero sales caused by an empty shelf hide real demand, so don't plan from them.
• Use one formula per key item: season quantity = last Ramadan's sales × (1 + the growth you expect) + safety stock covering the supplier's lead time.

Weeks 9 to 7 (7 to 27 December): suppliers and bundles

• Send each key supplier quantities and delivery dates in writing, with deliveries before 1 February so receiving doesn't clash with the e-invoicing deadline week or the first days of Ramadan.
• Set reordering rules with a minimum and a maximum for fast movers in Odoo Inventory, so a request for quotation is created when forecasted stock drops below the minimum. More in our guide to Odoo inventory management in Saudi Arabia.
• Lock purchase and selling prices now: a discount licence application needs your price list before and after the discount.
• Design bundles such as an iftar box for two, a suhoor combo, an Eid gift basket or a dates-and-coffee set, and price each one from the cost of its parts, not from a round number that looks attractive.

A bundle also saves the cashier steps, because it enters the cart as one product, and it leaves every single-item price untouched. Build it early and test it at the till before the month starts.

In the last six weeks the plan becomes rosters and tested systems. Test everything under pressure before 8 February, not at the first iftar.

Ramadan working hours in the private sector, and late-night shifts

• Article 98 of the Labor Law caps Muslim workers' actual hours in Ramadan at 6 a day or 36 a week, against 8 a day or 48 a week otherwise. The Ministry of Human Resources text is current: the Labor Law amendments in force since 19 February 2025 changed the overtime rules but left the Ramadan cap untouched.
• Overtime pays the hourly wage plus 50% of the basic wage, or paid compensatory days off if the worker agrees. All hours worked on holidays and Eid count as overtime.
• So trading until suhoor means more shifts, not longer ones: an afternoon shift ending near iftar and a night shift until suhoor. Check that your municipal licence covers those hours.
• Give seasonal cashiers the Supervised or Cashier access level in POS, not Manager.

POS, kitchen display and delivery apps

• Run an iftar-rush drill: dozens of orders in a few minutes, with receipt printers, kitchen screens and card terminals running together.
• Match delivery-app menus and prices with your till. For the UrbanPiper connector, the Saudi providers in Odoo's documentation include HungerStation, Jahez, Mrsool and Keeta.

An e-invoice for every sale

• If your revenue subject to VAT exceeded SAR 187,500 in any year from 2022 to 2025 and you were not in an earlier wave, you are in Wave 25 and must integrate by 1 February 2027; ZATCA notifies the businesses concerned. See our Wave 25 e-invoicing guide.
• In Odoo, once the POS invoice journal is onboarded with a FATOORA OTP and a customer is set on the order, each receipt is reported to ZATCA in real time with the Phase 2 QR code. Orders taken offline sync when the connection returns, but connected card terminals need the internet to work.

Cash handling

• Set an opening float per till, record every cash in or out with a reason, and close each register daily by counting coins and notes.
• Set a maximum authorized difference, so a larger gap needs a manager before the session closes.

Any price cut you advertise needs a Ministry of Commerce discount licence, obtained online before the announcement. If you are unsure whether an offer counts as a discount, ask the Ministry on its unified number 1900 first.

What the discount licence (also called a discount permit) requires, according to the Ministry's discount licensing service page:

• A commercial registration, commercial agency or trademark registered with the Ministry, and a login to the e-discounts system with a username and password or through Nafath.
• A list of the discounted products and of their prices before and after the discount.
• Payment through SADAD: SAR 300 per shop according to the service page, as of October 2026. The steps include entering invoices for products the system selects, so keep past invoices that prove the pre-discount price; Odoo's POS order history helps.
• A printed licence on display. Customers scan its QR code to see the discount type, percentage, duration and store details.

In 2026 the Ramadan discount season opened on 13 Sha'ban (1 February 2026) and ran past Eid, and for the 2025 season the Ministry said Ramadan-season licences do not use up a store's annual discount days. Watch for the 1448 announcement in January.

Eid gift cards: start selling them with the last ten days, set values and an expiry date, and agree the accounting and VAT treatment with your accountant first.

Copy-paste WhatsApp and SMS messages (edit the brackets, send only to customers who agreed to receive offers, and give them a way to opt out):

• “Welcome to [store name]. Ramadan essentials are in: [items]. Our Ramadan hours are [time] to [time]; reply to pre-order.”
• “Iftar for two from [restaurant]: [items] for SAR [price] including VAT. Order before [time] and collect before Maghrib.”
• “[percentage] off [items] from [date] to [date]: SAR [price] before the discount, SAR [price] after. Ministry of Commerce licence no. [number].”
• “For Founding Day: [offer] on Monday 22 February at [branches], limited to [quantity] units.”
• “Eid gift cards are available at SAR [value] and SAR [value], valid until [date]. Reply STOP to opt out.”

Skip exaggerated lines such as “cheapest in town”. If a message announces a price cut, the Founding Day one included, get the licence first and quote the percentage, prices and dates exactly as they appear on it.

Odoo 20 covers most of this plan at the till. Combos, loyalty programs, gift cards, self-ordering and time-slot presets are in Odoo Community; the kitchen display and the delivery-app connector need Odoo Enterprise.

• Combos: a Combo product built from choices (main, drink, dessert), with an extra price for premium options. If a cashier adds a defined combo's items one by one, the POS suggests the combo price.
• Promotions and loyalty: programs with start and end dates, such as a Ramadan-only promotion, plus coupons, discount codes, Buy X Get Y and loyalty cards.
• Gift cards and eWallets: a gift card sold at the till downloads as a PDF with its code after payment; pre-printed cards can be loaded, and any card is redeemed by its code.
• Kitchen display (the Preparation Display, Enterprise): each screen gets its own product categories, such as grill, juices or desserts, and its own stages, with an alert timer per stage that highlights late orders.
• Self-ordering: a QR menu for browsing or for ordering and paying, or a kiosk. Kiosk customers pay after each order, cash is not accepted, and terminal payment works only with Adyen, Stripe or Viva.com terminals.
• Ordering by time: Manage orders by time on a preset such as Takeout sets time slots and a preparation capacity, so iftar pickups spread out instead of landing minutes before Maghrib.
• Snooze: make a sold-out item unavailable on the till and the self-order menu for a period you choose.

UrbanPiper also needs its own subscription on top of Enterprise. For everything new in this release, see Odoo 20 POS for Saudi retail stores and restaurants; for restaurants, see Odoo for restaurants and cafés in Saudi Arabia.

Your next step this week: pull last Ramadan's sales report and list your top sellers. Then tell METCH about your shop or restaurant. METCH, an official Odoo partner, sets up Odoo POS, the kitchen display, gift cards and ZATCA e-invoicing, migrates your data and trains your team. The earlier you start, the more of the countdown you keep for testing.