The chapter situates Jeddah, the port of Mecca, within the new Islamic polity and the networks of regional and interoceanic trade between the Indian Ocean and the Mediterranean. It traces the competition for control of the Red Sea ports from the expansion of the Ottoman Empire in the early sixteenth century to the establishment of the present system of states, focusing on the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. These were particularly marked by the introduction of steam shipping and the opening of the Suez Canal, leading to an increased interest of the British and French empires in the region. Ottoman governors further faced powerful merchants in Jeddah as well as the Sharifs of Mecca, who often contested their authority and hampered attempts at provincial and urban reform. After a brief interlude of Sharifian rule (1916–25), ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz Āl Saʿūd established his rule over the Hijaz.