Business Bay vs Dubai Hills Estate
At the median, Business Bay asks AED 3,188 per sqft against AED 2,240 in Dubai Hills Estate, 42% dearer per sqft. Half of Business Bay inventory sits between AED 2,650 and AED 3,664 per sqft, against AED 2,040 to AED 2,538 in Dubai Hills Estate.
Business Bay carries the larger pipeline: 68 tracked off-plan projects and 1,458 priced units, against 46 projects and 328 priced units in Dubai Hills Estate.
Payment plans are lighter before handover in Business Bay: the median plan asks 60% before keys across 124 published plans, against 80% across 61 plans in Dubai Hills Estate.
Price per sqft, and the band around it
Dot is the median AED per sqft, bar is p25 to p75. Figures after each name are the median AED per sqft and the priced units.
- Business Bay3,188 1,458
- Dubai Hills Estate2,240 328
Dot is the median asking price per sqft, bar is the middle half of the priced inventory. Bases are 1,458 priced units in Business Bay and 328 in Dubai Hills Estate.
Side by side
| Metric | Business Bay | Dubai Hills Estate |
|---|---|---|
| Off-plan projects tracked | 68 | 46 |
| Priced units | 1,458 | 328 |
| Median AED per sqft | 3,188 | 2,240 |
| AED per sqft, p25 to p75 | 2,650 to 3,664 | 2,040 to 2,538 |
| Median asking price | AED 3.61M | AED 2.67M |
| Lowest starting price | AED 650K | AED 872K |
| Median paid before handover | 60% | 80% |
| Plans with a post-handover tail | 20% | 10% |
| Peak handover year | 2027 (29 projects) | 2026 (13 projects) |
| Active developers | 50 | 13 |
Every figure is computed by OffplanIndex over developer-published unit inventories and payment plans. Rows a community cannot answer are left out rather than filled in. Not investment advice.
Price
Dubai Hills Estate is the cheaper side per sqft, at AED 2,240 against AED 3,188 in Business Bay, so Business Bay is 42% dearer per sqft. On the typical unit that reads as AED 2.67M for a median 1,178 sqft home in Dubai Hills Estate, against AED 3.61M for a median 1,209 sqft home in Business Bay.
Inventory is weighted differently. Business Bay is dominated by 2 BR units, 609 priced records at a median AED 2,969 per sqft and AED 3.76M a unit. Dubai Hills Estate leans to 2 BR units, 121 records at AED 2,216 per sqft and AED 2.77M a unit.
Entry pricing: the lowest published starting price is AED 650K in Business Bay and AED 872K in Dubai Hills Estate.
Supply and delivery
Business Bay peaks in 2027, when 29 of its 68 tracked projects are scheduled to hand over. Dubai Hills Estate peaks in 2026 with 13 of 46. Published handover dates move, so read them as developer intent rather than a delivered date.
Of the projects tracked, 37% in Business Bay and 61% in Dubai Hills Estate are listed as sold out or out of stock, which is the share of the pipeline no longer taking new bookings at listed prices.
50 developers are active in Business Bay, led by DAMAC, Select Group, Omniyat. Dubai Hills Estate has 13, led by Emaar, Ellington, H&H.
Go deeper
More comparisons
The full report: every community, every developer, ranked.
Business Bay and Dubai Hills Estate in context: price per sqft by community and developer, payment plan structures ranked by cash due before handover, the 2026 to 2029 delivery pipeline, and the CSV behind every table. PDF plus data, delivered instantly.
Source: OffplanIndex derived analytics, built 2026-09-02 from developer-published project facts and unit inventories aggregated from public portals (latest observation 2026-07-30). All statistics are computed by OffplanIndex; no third-party database is reproduced. See the methodology and data policy. Not investment advice.