Fidya for Missed Fasts: Who Pays It and How Much

What is fidya?

Fidya is the feeding owed for a fast that could not be kept: for every missed day of Ramadan, a poor person is fed for a day, or given the value of that food. The Qur'an itself gives this concession — "a ransom of feeding a poor person" — for those who can fast only with hardship.

Fidya is not a shortcut around fasting. It belongs to a narrow group of people, and in the Hanafi school it is measured exactly like fitrana: the same staple amounts, the same per-person prices — one day's fidya equals one person's Sadaqah-e-Fitr.

Who can pay fidya instead of fasting?

The clear case is the shaykh al-fani — the elderly person whose strength is gone and is not expected to return — and the person with a lasting illness for whom fasting is genuinely harmful and recovery is not expected. For them, fasting will never realistically become possible, so fidya closes the account for each day.

Everyone else keeps the duty to make up the fast (qada). A traveller, a woman in menstruation or post-natal bleeding, and a patient who is expected to recover must fast the missed days later. Paying fidya does not lift that duty for them, however generous the payment.

Open the fitrana & fidya calculator

How much is fidya per day?

One day's fidya is one person's fitrana: in the Dar al-Ifta (Minhaj-ul-Quran) rates for Ramadan 1447 Hijri / 2026, that is Rs 310 at the wheat level, Rs 1,180 for barley, Rs 2,400 for medium dates, Rs 4,800 for raisins, Rs 8,000 for cheese and Rs 20,000 for high-quality dates. Thirty missed days at the wheat level therefore come to Rs 9,300.

It can be paid as money to a poor person, or as actual food — feeding one poor person two meals for each day, or giving the dry staple itself. Our fitrana and fidya calculator has a fidya mode that multiplies the per-day amount by the number of days, and every rate in it is editable if prices have changed.

What if someone who paid fidya recovers?

If a person paid fidya because fasting seemed permanently impossible, and afterwards Allah grants health and fasting becomes possible, the Hanafi ruling is that the missed fasts must then be kept as qada — the fidya already given counts as charity, and its reward stands, but it no longer stands in place of the fasts.

The reverse also matters: if someone delays qada without excuse until the next Ramadan arrives, they have sinned by the delay even though the fasts themselves are still owed. Fidya never attaches to mere delay for a person who is able to fast.

What is the difference between fidya and fitrana?

The amounts are equal; the causes are opposite ends of Ramadan. Fitrana is paid by every able Muslim because Ramadan ended — it is tied to Eid, paid per person including children, and owed even by someone who fasted perfectly. Fidya is paid only for specific missed fasts, only by (or for) someone who cannot make those fasts up, and it is counted per day, not per person.

A household can owe both in the same Ramadan: fitrana for everyone, and fidya for a grandfather who could not fast at all. Calculate both in one place with our fitrana and fidya calculator — and for anything beyond these common cases, ask a mufti rather than guessing.