Zakat Nisab in Pakistan: Gold, Silver and How to Work Out Your Zakat
Zakat is 2.5% of the wealth that stays above a minimum threshold, called nisab, for one full Islamic lunar year. The confusing part in Pakistan is the rupee figure, because it moves every single day with the gold and silver rate. This guide separates the fixed parts — the tola and gram thresholds and the 2.5% rate — from the parts that change, and gives you an order for adding assets so the answer is defensible.
Nisab in tola and grams
| Metal | Nisab | In grams (1 tola = 11.664 g) |
|---|---|---|
| Gold | 7.5 tola | about 87.48 g |
| Silver | 52.5 tola | about 612.36 g |
If your wealth is only gold, the gold nisab applies. If your wealth is a mixture of gold, cash, bank balances and silver, many Pakistani institutions use the silver nisab, because it is the lower of the two and therefore includes more people. Different scholars apply this differently, so follow the guidance you already trust.
The rate and the one-year condition
The rate is 2.5%, which is one fortieth of your net zakatable wealth. Zakat becomes due once that wealth has stayed at or above nisab for a full Islamic lunar year (about 354 days), counted from the date your wealth first reached nisab. Many people fix one date in the Islamic calendar each year and value everything on that date, which makes the calculation repeatable.
What counts as zakatable wealth
- Cash at home, current accounts, and savings or profit-and-loss sharing balances.
- Gold and silver, whether coins, bars or jewellery — follow your scholar on jewellery in regular use.
- Money owed to you that you expect to receive, such as a personal loan you gave.
- Business stock held for sale, valued at what it would sell for today rather than what it cost.
- Shares, mutual funds and other investments, valued as your scholar advises.
What is normally not counted
The house you live in, the car you drive, everyday household items, clothing and the tools you use to earn a living are not zakatable wealth, because they are in personal use rather than held as savings. That does not mean the calculation is optional — if you hold meaningful savings or metal, the calculation applies to those.
Deduct the liabilities that are due
Most Pakistani zakat guidance allows you to deduct debts that have become due: outstanding loan balances, instalments already due, bills you have received before your zakat date, unpaid salaries you owe and payables to suppliers. Whether you deduct the whole outstanding balance or only the amounts currently due depends on the ruling you follow, so keep your deduction list separate and clean instead of mixing it into your assets.
How to value gold
Value it at the rate on your zakat date, using the weight you actually hold. If you work in tola, use the per-tola rate from a market page you trust; if you prefer grams, divide the per-tola rate by 11.664. Account for purity too: 24 karat is pure, while 22 and 21 karat pieces contain less gold and are therefore worth less than the pure-gold rate per tola.
A worked example
Suppose that on your zakat date the rate you check is Rs 300,000 per tola, and you own 10 tola of gold, Rs 500,000 in a savings account and Rs 200,000 in cash.
- Gold: 10 × 300,000 = Rs 3,000,000
- Cash and savings: Rs 700,000
- Total assets: Rs 3,700,000
- Minus a due instalment of Rs 200,000: net wealth Rs 3,500,000
- Net wealth is well above nisab, so zakat is 2.5%: Rs 87,500
The rate above is only an example so the arithmetic is clear — use the rate you actually see on your zakat date.
Open the free Zakat calculator →Banks and the yearly statutory deduction
Separately from your own calculation, Pakistani banks deduct zakat on certain savings, profit-and-loss sharing and similar accounts on the first day of Ramadan, using a threshold notified each year by the government. For the 1446–47 AH year the notified threshold was Rs 503,529 for the specified account types. That figure is a bank-deduction threshold for particular accounts, not a replacement for your own nisab calculation, and it changes from year to year.
Calculate it in five minutes
- Open the calculators and keep this guide next to them.
- Refresh the current gold and silver rate before you type any number.
- Enter your cash, bank balances and the weight of gold and silver you hold.
- Add receivables and business stock if they apply to you.
- Deduct the debts that are due, then read the 2.5% result.
Our zakat calculator and gold zakat calculator both run entirely in your browser, so the amounts you type are never sent to a server.
Sources
- The Citizens Foundation — zakat guidance and nisab weights
- Dawat-e-Islami — zakat calculator, liabilities and valuation guidance
- State Bank of Pakistan — bank zakat deduction threshold
Zakat rules differ between schools of thought, and the rupee value of nisab changes daily. This page is general information, not a religious ruling. Follow the scholar or institution you trust for your own case.