On a computer there is no compass: the dial only turns when you drag it. On a phone, tap “Turn on the compass” and hold the phone flat. Metal, magnets, speakers and laptops nearby disturb a phone’s compass by several degrees: step away from them, and trust a landmark or the sun over a reading that keeps moving.
Face west, 278.8° clockwise from true north. The shortest path leaves Baoding on this heading and reaches the Kaaba from the northeast.
A compass needle, and the sensor inside a phone, point to magnetic north: a spot in the Arctic that drifts every year. The Qibla is measured from true north, the North Pole. So the compass on this page reads the phone’s magnetic heading and adds the local difference before comparing it with 278.8°.
Many simple compass pages show the phone’s raw reading. The gap below is how far their needle sits from the true Qibla, and how far from the Kaaba that line passes.
On a Mercator map a straight line keeps one compass heading, but it is not the shortest path. The Qibla is the direction of the great circle, the shortest route over the Earth’s surface. From Baoding the two differ by 24°; the difference grows the farther you are from Makkah.
A phone compass is only as good as its sensor and its surroundings: inside a car, near a speaker or on a steel table it can be off by many degrees. When the reading keeps jumping, calibrate it, or use a landmark whose direction you know.
| City | Country | Bearing | Magnetic | Direction | Distance |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Montreal مونتريال |
Canada | 58.7° | 72.3° 13.6° W | east-northeast | 9,999 km |
New York نيويورك |
United States | 58.5° | 70.9° 12.5° W | east-northeast | 10,306 km |
Toronto تورونتو |
Canada | 54.6° | 64.7° 10.1° W | northeast | 10,493 km |
São Paulo ساو باولو |
Brazil | 68.9° | 90.8° 21.9° W | east-northeast | 10,603 km |
Chicago شيكاغو |
United States | 48.7° | 52.8° 4.2° W | northeast | 11,149 km |
Buenos Aires بوينس آيرس |
Argentina | 76.3° | 86.6° 10.3° W | east-northeast | 12,061 km |
Houston هيوستن |
United States | 45.5° | 43.8° 1.7° E | northeast | 12,574 km |
Los Angeles لوس أنجلوس |
United States | 23.9° | 12.5° 11.3° E | north-northeast | 13,424 km |
Mexico City مدينة مكسيكو |
Mexico | 46.6° | 42.7° 3.9° E | northeast | 13,646 km |