Social protection policies, aiming at reducing economic and social vulnerability, poverty and large discrepancies in access to services, have consistently been viewed not just as morally right, but also as a central indicator and guarantor of long-term development and political stability. In this chapter on social protection in Egypt, we aim to tackle three points. First, we start with a brief discussion of the dilemmas typically faced by low- and middle-income countries with regard to social protection programmes. We then move to present the historical trajectory of social protection programmes in Egypt. Our main focus is the period starting from 1952 till today. In section three, we used data of the Egyptian Household Income, Expenditure and Consumption Survey, and the authors’ own original survey and focus group data, to conduct a simple performance assessment test of two of Egypt’s social assistance programmes; Takaful and Karama Programme and Urgent Response Programmes rolled out during Corona pandemic. Specifically, we assess how effective these programmes have been in targeting the poor in Egypt.