DST 
Palm Central
Palm Central, Dubai: what the island's own numbers say
Most off-plan property in Dubai asks a buyer to take a completion date on trust. Palm Jebel Ali is unusual: Nakheel publishes the progress percentages itself, and they currently read 26.75% overall — 93.27% of substructure against 21.64% of building work. Palm Central, the island's first apartments, is being sold into that gap, for handover in September 2030.
What the single percentage hides
An island is built in an order, and a blended figure averages across stages that are nowhere near each other. Nakheel's breakdown:
- Substructure 93.27% — the land itself, effectively done.
- Superstructure 68.40% — frames going up.
- Infrastructure 65.05% — roads, services, the things that make an address reachable.
- Building work 21.64% — the part a resident would recognise.
- MEP 18.76% — mechanical, electrical and plumbing, the last long job before a handover date means anything.
Read in that order the figure stops being a progress bar and becomes a sequence: the hard civil engineering is behind, and four years of finishing is what the September 2030 date is actually made of.
Palm Central is on the Spine, not a frond
The fronds of Palm Jebel Ali are villa land. The Spine is the through-road, and it is where Nakheel has put the community-scale buildings — which is why the island's only apartments are there. By frond, Nakheel's inspection of 10 March 2026 recorded Frond M at 22.10% and Frond N at 29.20%; those are Palm Central's neighbours, and their numbers are the best available answer to what the view will be doing while you wait.
The scale it sits inside
Palm Jebel Ali covers 13.4 square kilometres, roughly twice Palm Jumeirah, across seven islands and sixteen fronds, adding more than 90km of beachfront and around 110km of coastline to Dubai. In April 2026 The National reported Nakheel awarding contracts worth AED 3.5 billion for 544 villas, split between two contractors across Fronds A to F. Three low-rise buildings on the Spine are an early and small piece of that.
Two entry prices circulate for this project and only one is current. AED 2.5 million is Phase 1, released October 2025 and sold out; AED 2.7 million is Phase 2, the inventory actually on sale. A listing quoting the lower number without saying which release it belongs to is quoting a flat that is no longer for sale by the developer.
Where to go from here
- What the price ladder says about the product — and where AED 2.7 million sits in Dubai's 2026 market.
- Four years of instalments, and what "construction-linked" means when the developer publishes its own progress.
- The Spine, the fronds either side, and the airport question.
- Every unit clears the AED 2 million threshold — which is the start of the question, not the end.
- The questions buyers actually ask.
Dubai's wider market is on the news feed, the residency route is on the Golden Visa page, and the project's own enquiry pages sit on palmcentral.dst.llc. If you would rather talk to someone, contact is here.
How far along is Palm Jebel Ali?
Nakheel's own construction-progress page puts the island at 26.75% overall. The number is not one thing: substructure is at 93.27% and building work at 21.64%, which is the difference between an island that exists and homes that can be lived in.
What is Palm Central?
The first apartment product on Palm Jebel Ali, on the Spine rather than a frond. The second phase, reported by The National on 24 June 2026, put 222 homes on sale from AED 2.7 million, in three low-rise buildings, for handover in September 2030.
Is the first phase still available?
No. Phase 1 released in October 2025 and sold out; what trades now is resale. Most third-party listings still quote its AED 2.5 million entry price, which is why a headline figure and a purchase price can differ by AED 200,000 for the same size of flat.
How big is Palm Jebel Ali compared with Palm Jumeirah?
About twice the size — 13.4 square kilometres, seven islands and sixteen fronds, adding more than 90km of beachfront. Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum announced the relaunch on 31 May 2023.
Progress percentages, the component split and the per-frond figures of 10 March 2026: Nakheel, construction progress for Palm Jebel Ali, read 22 September 2026. Phase 2 unit count, entry price and handover: The National, 24 June 2026. Island area, island and frond counts, beachfront and the 31 May 2023 relaunch, and the AED 3.5 billion villa contracts of April 2026: The National and Nakheel. Nothing here is investment advice.