Meta Platforms, Inc. (META) is one of the most searched stocks among Muslim investors asking "Is META halal?" We screened META against all five major Shariah screening methodologies — AAOIFI, Dow Jones Islamic Market (DJIM), FTSE Shariah, MSCI Islamic, and S&P Shariah — using real financial data from the Halal Terminal API.

Quick Verdict: META is COMPLIANT (5/5 methodologies pass)

Meta Platforms, Inc. passes all five Shariah screening methodologies. Business activity is permissible and financial ratios are within limits. Purification rate: 0.6%.

Methodology-by-Methodology Results

Different Shariah screening standards use different financial thresholds and denominators. Here are META's results across all five:

Methodology Result Notes
AAOIFI PASS Debt/assets at 11.2% — comfortably below 30%. Strong balance sheet.
DJIM PASS Debt/market-cap 1.3%, cash/market-cap 2.8% — both well below 33% thresholds.
FTSE PASS Debt/assets 11.2% under 50%. Cash+receivables/assets 32.6% under 50%.
MSCI PASS All asset-based ratios under 33.33%. Clean compliance profile.
S&P PASS All market-cap-based ratios under 3%. Meta's large market cap gives wide compliance margins.

What Does Meta Platforms Do?

Meta Platforms operates Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Messenger — the world's largest social media platforms — along with its Reality Labs division (Quest VR headsets, metaverse). Nearly all of Meta's revenue (97%+) comes from digital advertising. **The advertising question:** Some scholars raise concerns about Meta's advertising model since it may serve ads for prohibited products (alcohol, gambling, interest-based financial products). However, the majority scholarly position holds that an advertising platform is not itself engaged in those prohibited activities — the platform provides a permissible service (connecting advertisers with audiences), and the responsibility for the advertised product lies with the advertiser, not the platform. **The content question:** Meta's platforms host a wide range of user-generated content, some of which may include impermissible material. Similar to the advertising question, most screening methodologies focus on the company's primary business activity (technology/advertising platform) rather than user-generated content, as Meta is not producing the content itself. Under all five major Shariah screening methodologies, Meta passes the business activity screen as a technology/advertising company.

Business activity screening result: PASS — Digital advertising and social media platform — permissible primary activity under majority scholarly opinion

Financial Ratio Breakdown

Shariah screening evaluates a company's financial structure to ensure it doesn't rely excessively on interest-bearing debt or hold too much cash in interest-bearing accounts. Here are META's actual ratios compared to the thresholds:

Ratio META Actual Threshold
Debt / Total Assets 11.2% < 30% (AAOIFI) / < 33% (MSCI)
Debt / Market Cap 1.3% < 33% (DJIM, S&P)
Cash / Total Assets 24.4% < 30% (AAOIFI) / < 33% (MSCI)
Cash / Market Cap 2.8% < 33% (DJIM, S&P)
Receivables / Total Assets 8.2% < 30% (AAOIFI) / < 33% (MSCI)
Receivables / Market Cap 1.0% < 33% (DJIM, S&P)
Interest Income / Revenue 0.6% < 5% (all methodologies)

Purification Rate

META's purification rate is 0.6%. This means for every $1,000 in dividends received from META, you should donate $6.00 to charity to purify the impermissible income portion (interest income relative to total revenue).

What is purification?

Even Shariah-compliant companies may earn small amounts of interest income. The purification rate tells you what percentage of dividends to donate to charity to "cleanse" your income. Read our full purification guide →

Detailed Analysis

Meta passes all five Shariah screening methodologies from a financial perspective. The purification rate of 0.6% is very low — for every $1,000 in dividends, only $6 needs purification. The more nuanced discussion for Muslim investors is around the business activity screen and whether social media advertising constitutes a permissible business. The majority position among Shariah boards (AAOIFI, DJIM, S&P Shariah) is that technology platforms are permissible. Investors who take a stricter personal position on content-related concerns should consult their own scholar.

Screen META Yourself via API

Get real-time screening results for META (or any stock) using the Halal Terminal API:

curl https://api.halalterminal.com/api/screen/META \
  -H "X-API-Key: YOUR_KEY"

Or in Python:

import requests

resp = requests.post(
    "https://api.halalterminal.com/api/screen/META",
    headers={"X-API-Key": "YOUR_KEY"}
)
data = resp.json()

print(f"Compliant: {data['is_compliant']}")
print(f"AAOIFI:    {data['aaoifi_compliant']}")
print(f"DJIM:      {data['djim_compliant']}")
print(f"Purification: {data['purification_rate']:.1%}")

The API returns compliance status across all 5 methodologies, actual financial ratios, purification rate, and business activity screening — all in a single call.

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Key Takeaways