I slept through suhūr. Is my fast still valid?
Yes. Suhūr — the meal before dawn — is recommended, not a condition of validity. If you miss it, your fast is complete and there is nothing to make up. It is recommended because there is blessing in it and because it makes the day easier, not because the fast does not count without it.
The four schools concur on this.
It helps to separate two categories that are easily confused in a first Ramadan: what makes a fast valid, and what makes it better.
What makes it valid: the intention, and abstaining from food, drink and intimacy from dawn to sunset.
What makes it better: taking suhūr, delaying it until close to dawn, breaking the fast promptly at sunset, doing so with dates or water, feeding another person who is fasting.
Suhūr belongs to the second list. The Prophet ﷺ said: “Take suhūr, for in suhūr there is blessing” (Sahih al-Bukhari 1923). That is a clear encouragement, not a condition.
So if you slept through it, got home late, or simply did not feel like eating, your fast counts all the same and you owe nothing.
Two practical notes. First: although it is not obligatory, skipping it repeatedly makes the month considerably harder, and much of the exhaustion people attribute to fasting actually comes from not having eaten or drunk before dawn. Second: if you wake and dawn has already come in, you do not eat; you begin the fast from there and it is still valid.
- HadithSahih al-Bukhari 1923