Jeddah Tower has passed the 100-storey mark and climbed beyond 400 metres, pushing Saudi Arabia’s signature skyscraper closer to a finish line that would put it in a class of its own. The tower, designed by Adrian Smith and Gordon Gill, is being built to reach 1 kilometre and become the world’s first kilometre-high building.
The milestone matters because the tower is no longer a concept on paper or a rendering in a presentation deck. New drone footage from May 2026 shows its concrete and steel core rising above the surrounding landscape, a visible sign that the project has moved into the final stretch of a build that has already taken years to resume and advance. For readers searching the world's tallest buildings, the comparison is immediate: Dubai’s Burj Khalifa stands at 830 metres, and Jeddah Tower is expected to top it by at least 180 metres.
When complete, the tower is set to become the flagship of the $20 billion Jeddah Economic City project and will house a luxury Four Seasons hotel, residential units, office space and an observation deck. Guests are expected to look out from 644 metres above street level, with a viewing platform on the 157th floor. Double-decker elevators are designed to travel at more than 10 metres per second, and the building uses a concrete-based structural system rather than a conventional steel framework.
The engineering behind it is as ambitious as the height. The foundation rests on a five-metre-thick concrete raft supported by 270 bored piles, each 1.8 metres across and driven as deep as 105 metres below ground. The project covers 530,000 square metres, and its projected construction budget is around £885 million, or USD$1.2 billion.
What is missing is the one date everyone wants. The tower is clearly moving closer to completion, but no completion date has been given, leaving the next step as continued construction toward the 1-kilometre target. For now, the story is not when Jeddah Tower will open. It is that the structure meant to redefine the skyline is finally tall enough to make that question feel close.
