Spain's Lorenzo grabbed the 52nd pole of his career and his seventh at Losail, edging out Briton Cal Crutchlow (Yamaha), with Honda's Dani Pedrosa, runner-up to Lorenzo in last year's world championship title race, in third.
Crutchlow led for much of the session before Lorenzo produced a quickest flying lap of 1min 54.714sec.
"It's great to finish in pole position, especially knowing Cal was extremely fast over one lap," Lorezno told the sport's official website motogp.com.
"When he did a 54.9, I didn't think it would be possible to beat it, but I put in everything I could and did a very good lap.
"So we're in pole position and have a good advantage and pace for tomorrow. I hope to make a good start, just focusing on our own pace."
Spain's Moto2 champion Marc Marquez will start on the second row on his MotoGP debut after posting the sixth quickest time, with nine-time champion Valentino Rossi, back at Yamaha after a frustrating spell with Ducati, on the third row.
A new qualifying format saw the top 12 riders go head-to-head in a 15 minute shootout for pole.
Lorenzo, aiming to emulate last year's Losail win from pole, reflected: "It's very different to last year and I think more fun for the fans to watch.
"From the point of view of the riders, I feel more nervous and with more pressure on me because you know you have only four attempts for your last lap - and not 15 like last year! So it's more important to go quickly and not make a mistake."
Rossi, who has won here for Yamaha in 2005, 2006 and 2010, was frustrated at missing out on the first two rows on his debut start since returning to the team.
"Qualifying was not fantastic," the Italian said.
"Our performance in free practice was better than this, so we'll wait for tomorrow. Unfortunately in qualifying, on the second tyre - with which I could have improved - I was stuck in traffic so could not improve my lap time and lost some positions.
"For sure, tomorrow becomes more difficult to start from further back, but we have good pace so we can be quite competitive."
Pol Espargaro will start on pole in the Moto2 race with Luis Salom leading KTM to a first four shut-out in the Moto3 grid.
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