The iqama is the second call to prayer in Islam, pronounced immediately before a congregation rises to perform the obligatory prayer, distinguishing it from the adhan, the first call that summons the faithful to the mosque from a distance. Shorter and delivered more rapidly and quietly than the adhan, it repeats the same phrases affirming God's greatness, the testimony of faith, and the summons to prayer and to success, with the added announcement that the prayer is now beginning. Where the adhan gathers the community, the iqama marks the precise moment at which the assembled worshippers form their rows and the prayer commences, so that the two calls frame the interval between summons and worship. Its wording differs in small details between the legal schools, and it is a fixed part of the establishment of the five daily prayers, sounding in mosques across the Muslim world at each prayer time as the immediate signal to begin.
Sunni and Shia practice differ on points of the iqama's wording and on whether it should be recited by the same person who gave the adhan, and the Hanafi school in particular preserves a formula distinct in small but consistent ways from that used by the Shafii, Maliki and Hanbali schools, differences that worshippers moving between mosques of different traditions can notice even though the overall structure and purpose of the call remain the same everywhere. Unlike the adhan, the iqama is not typically broadcast outside the mosque, since its audience is already the assembled congregation rather than the wider community.