The trans-Saharan slave trade, which lasted for over a thousand years, was a brutal institution that is often overshadowed by its more famous Atlantic cousin. The trade involved the enslavement of people from subsaharan Africa who were transported across the Sahara desert to be sold in the Muslim world and beyond, including North Africa, the Levant, Iran, Arabia, Anatolia, and even as far as India.

The trade fluctuated over time, with an average of about 10,000 slaves transported across the trans-Saharan routes during the medieval period. The trade was facilitated by the conversion of subsaharan African kingdoms to Islam, which intensified the trade and encouraged the creation of safe routes across the Sahara that doubled as avenues for the slave trade.

The slaves were overwhelmingly African pagans, as Islamic law forbade a Muslim from enslaving another Muslim. The trade had six main routes, each of which was bound to the power of various kingdoms, and the trans-Saharan slave trade is believed to have been a longer-lasting and possibly larger system than the Atlantic slave trade.