Current Tallest Building Under Construction
The tallest building currently under construction is the Jeddah Tower in Saudi Arabia, designed to surpass the Burj Khalifa as the world's tallest structure. The project is being developed by Jeddah Economic Company with structural engineering led by Adrian Smith + Gordon Gill Architecture. As of the latest public updates, the tower is planned to reach a height of over 1,000 meters (3,280 feet), making it the first building to officially cross the kilometer mark. The construction site is located in the Jeddah Economic City district, and the building is intended to include office space, hotel rooms, and residential apartments. You can follow the latest project overview on the official Jeddah Economic Company website Jeddah Economic Company.
The Jeddah Tower project has faced multiple pauses and restarts due to funding reviews, supply chain issues, and broader economic adjustments in the region. Despite these delays, the developer has continued to release updated renderings and construction milestones, confirming that the core structural work remains a priority. The building's design focuses on a tapering, asymmetrical silhouette optimized for wind loads and structural stability at extreme heights. Its foundation relies on a massive reinforced concrete mat supported by deep piles driven into the underlying geology of the Red Sea coastal plain.
Key Construction Details and Timeline
Construction of the Jeddah Tower officially resumed in earnest after a multi-year hiatus, with contractor estimates pointing to a multi-phase completion timeline extending into the late 2020s. The main structural core is being built using a reinforced concrete slipform system, a method commonly used for supertall towers to ensure continuous vertical progression. The facade will feature a high-performance glass curtain wall system designed to reduce solar heat gain while maintaining transparency at extreme elevations. Mechanical systems, including high-speed elevators capable of traveling over 10 meters per second, are being integrated to serve the building's occupied floors efficiently.
The project's timeline has been adjusted several times, with the latest public statements indicating that the structural crown could be completed by the end of the decade, pending funding and regulatory approvals. The tower is being developed in phases, with the lower podium levels intended for hotel and retail use, while the upper floors will house residential and office spaces. Structural testing and wind tunnel studies have been conducted to validate the building's performance under extreme wind and seismic conditions. For a deeper look at the engineering challenges of supertall construction, you can read the technical analysis on the Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat website Council on Tall Buildings and Urban Habitat.
How It Compares to the Current Tallest Building
The Burj Khalifa in Dubai, standing at 828 meters (2,717 feet), remains the tallest completed building in the world and the primary benchmark the Jeddah Tower aims to exceed. The Burj Khalifa was completed in 2010 and held the title of tallest building for over a decade, using a buttressed core structural system and a Y-shaped floor plan to manage lateral forces. Its construction was managed by Samsung C&T Corporation, with Adrian Smith serving as the lead architect, and it took approximately six years from groundbreaking to structural completion. The Burj Khalifa's success established a new standard for vertical construction, pushing the industry to develop new materials, pumping technologies, and wind engineering methods.
The Jeddah Tower is designed to be more than 180 meters taller than the Burj Khalifa, requiring advances in concrete strength, pumping height, and wind resistance. While the Burj Khalifa used conventional high-strength concrete pumped to record heights, the Jeddah Tower demands even higher-performance materials and more sophisticated construction logistics due to its greater total height. The project also reflects a shift in the global supertall market, with