Navratri Mantras for All Nine Days — Sharad Navratri 2026
The goddess and her mantra for every date from 11 to 19 October, in Devanagari, with transliteration and plain meaning
When is Navratri 2026?
Sharad Navratri 2026 begins with Ghatasthapana on Sunday 11 October. Saptami runs across two sunrises this year, so Durga Ashtami and Maha Navami both fall on Monday 19 October in the New Delhi panchang, with the Sandhi Puja at their junction that morning, about 10:27 to 11:15 am IST.5,6Vijayadashami (Dussehra) is Tuesday 20 October; Bengal keeps Vijayadashami on Wednesday 21 October.7,8
Tithis begin and end at different times in different cities. If your family follows a local temple or regional calendar, its dates come first.
Sharad Navratri 2026
The Navratri mantra for each of the 9 days
Day-by-day dates follow Prokerala (Ujjain, IST).6 Drik Panchang’s New Delhi calendar keeps Sunday 18 as a second Saptamī, with Mahāgaurī Pūjā and Durgā Aṣṭamī on Monday 19 and Navamī on Tuesday 20.5 Day mantras from Drik Panchang’s page for each goddess.4
Vijayadaśamī (Dussehra): Durgā’s victory over Mahiṣāsura
Why Day 8 and Day 9 overlap: Aṣṭamī begins on Sunday morning and runs into Monday morning, and Navamī follows it until Tuesday midday. Drik Panchang keeps Durgā Aṣṭamī on Monday 19 October; Prokerala lists Mahāgaurī’s pūjā on Sunday 18 and Durgāṣṭamī and Mahā Navamī on Monday 19. The table follows Prokerala’s order.5,6 The colours are a modern custom that changes every year; both calendars give the same nine for 2026.
Devī Kavacham 3–5 · the verse that names all nine1,2
First, Śailaputrī; second, Brahmacāriṇī; third, the one called Candraghaṇṭā; and Kūṣmāṇḍā, the fourth. Fifth, Skandamātā; sixth, Kātyāyanī; seventh, Kālarātri; and Mahāgaurī, the eighth. Ninth, Siddhidātrī. These are proclaimed the nine Durgās. These names were spoken by the great Brahmā himself.
The order of the nine nights is not a modern list. It is this verse. Some editions open it prathamaṃ śailaputrī ca; the sense is the same.14
On the first morning a water pot is set up and worshipped, the ghaṭa of Ghaṭasthāpana, and for nine nights one form of Durgā is honoured on each, always in the same order. Many households spend those nights reading the Devī Māhātmya, the seven hundred verses also called the Durgā Saptaśatī, and the Devī Kavacham is one of the hymns said with it.1,10
For each goddess below you will find her day mantra, a salutation in a single breath, and the short verse recited at her pūjā, lifted from the Navadurgā Stotram and checked line by line against Drik Panchang; where the two differ, the note under the verse says so.3,4 Under all nine runs one more mantra, which belongs to no single night.
The Navārṇa mantra · Durgā Saptaśatī, Navārṇa vidhi9
Navārṇa means nine syllables. Count them after the ॐ: aiṃ, hrīṃ, klīṃ, cā, mu, ṇḍā, yai, vi, cce. The vidhi that sets it out names its seers as Brahmā, Viṣṇu and Rudra, its deity as Caṇḍikā in the form of Mahākālī, Mahālakṣmī and Mahāsarasvatī, and gives one instruction for the mantra itself: chant it 108 times. Many households do, on each of the nine days, alongside that day’s goddess.
For the gaining of what I wish, I bow to Śailaputrī, the glorious: the half-moon set as her crest, riding the bull, bearing the trident.
She is Pārvatī born again as the daughter of the Himalaya: śaila is the mountain, putrī the daughter. She rides a bull, a trident in her right hand and a lotus in her left.4 Her verse asks for nothing in particular, only vāñchita-lābha, the gaining of what is wished. The first night leaves the wish to you.
Holding a rosary and a water pot in her lotus hands, may the goddess Brahmacāriṇī, unsurpassed, be gracious to me.
She walks barefoot, a japa rosary in her right hand and a water pot in her left: Pārvatī in the long penance she keeps to win Śiva.4 Her verse names the two things she carries and nothing else. On the second night the whole teaching is in her hands.
Mounted on the finest of beasts, armed with the weapons of fierce wrath, she who is known as Candraghaṇṭā extends her grace to me.
A half-moon rests on her forehead in the shape of a bell, a ghaṇṭā, and gives her her name. Her ten hands hold a trident, a mace, a sword, a bow and an arrow, and with them a lotus, a rosary and a water pot; yet the tradition counts this form as peaceful: the sound of the moon-bell is said to drive away whatever troubles her devotees.4 She is the first of the nine whose name you can hear.
The first three nights
Becoming
The festival opens on Pārvatī’s own life, told in order: the daughter of the mountain, the young woman in penance, the bride with the moon on her brow. Each form is the one before it, a little further on.
सुरासम्पूर्णकलशं रुधिराप्लुतमेव च । दधाना हस्तपद्माभ्यां कूष्माण्डा शुभदास्तु मे ॥
surāsampūrṇakalaśaṃ rudhirāplutam eva ca · dadhānā hastapadmābhyāṃ kūṣmāṇḍā śubhadāstu me
Holding in her lotus hands a jar brimming with surā and one steeped in blood, may Kūṣmāṇḍā be the giver of good to me.
She lives at the centre of the sun, and the tradition says she made the cosmic egg, brahmāṇḍa, with a small smile. Her name also holds kūṣmāṇḍa, the white pumpkin offered to her.4 Her verse is the boldest of the nine: two jars, one of surā and one of blood, and still the request is simply that she be kind.
Seated always on her lion throne, both hands resting on lotuses, may the glorious goddess Skandamātā ever be the giver of good.
Drik Panchang reads padmāñcita, “adorned with lotuses”, where Sanskrit Documents reads padmāśrita, “resting on lotuses”. The verse above follows Sanskrit Documents.
She sits on a lion with the infant Skanda, Murugan, in her lap, lotuses in her upper hands. The tradition holds that whoever worships her worships her son as well, a promise no other form of the nine carries.4 Her mantra keeps the grammar of motherhood: the word is mātṛ, mother, so the salutation is skandamātre, not skandamātāyai.
Her hand ablaze with the Candrahāsa sword, the finest tiger her mount: may the goddess Kātyāyanī, slayer of demons, grant what is good.
Sanskrit Documents prints dadyādevī, a letter short; the line above follows Drik Panchang’s dadyād devī.
Pārvatī takes this form to destroy Mahiṣāsura, and the name comes from the sage Kātya, in whose house she is born.4 Temple images seat her on a lion. Her verse gives her another mount, śārdūla, the tiger, and puts the sword called Candrahāsa bright in her hand.
The middle three nights
What she holds
Then the scale changes. Kūṣmāṇḍā holds the sun, Skandamātā holds a god in her lap, Kātyāyanī holds a sword. The middle nights are about what she carries.
A single braid, hibiscus at her ears, unclothed, seated on a donkey; long-lipped, ear-rings in her ears, her body glistening with oil; an ornament of iron thorns flashing on her left foot; her hair raised high like a banner: dark Kālarātri, the terrifying.
She is the darkest of the nine, and the only one whose verse runs to two full ślokas. Yet her right hands are raised in blessing and in giving, abhaya and varada, and so she carries a second name, Śubhaṅkarī: she who does good.4
Mounted on a white bull, dressed in white, pure: may Mahāgaurī, who delights Mahādeva, grant what is good.
Everything about her is white: the bull, the clothes, the complexion the tradition compares to the conch, the moon and the white kunda jasmine.4 Her verse says it twice in a single line, śvete vṛṣe, śvetāmbaradharā. Durgā Aṣṭamī is her day. In 2026 Prokerala begins her pūjā on Sunday 18, the morning Aṣṭamī begins; both calendars checked here keep Durgā Aṣṭamī itself on Monday 19 October.5,6
सिद्धगन्धर्वयक्षाद्यैरसुरैरमरैरपि । सेव्यमाना सदा भूयात् सिद्धिदा सिद्धिदायिनी ॥
siddhagandharvayakṣādyair asurair amarair api · sevyamānā sadā bhūyāt siddhidā siddhidāyinī
Served by siddhas, gandharvas and yakṣas, by demons and by gods alike, may she ever be the giver of attainment, the bestower of attainment.
She sits on a lotus and gives the siddhis, the powers of attainment.4 Her verse lists who comes to serve her, siddhas, gandharvas, yakṣas, and then, in one breath, asurair amarair api: demons and gods together. On the last night even the two sides of every war in the Purāṇas stand in the same line.
The last three nights
Night, then light
Kālarātri is darkness with a hand raised in blessing. Mahāgaurī is the same goddess, now all white. Siddhidātrī gives siddhi, the attainment of what Śailaputrī’s verse wished for on the first night. The nine forms end where they began.
The tenth day has no goddess of its own. It is the victory. In the Devī Māhātmya the gods pour out their energies, the energies gather into a single mass of light, and the light takes the form of the Goddess; across the second to fourth chapters she meets the buffalo-demon Mahiṣa, destroys his army, and then destroys him.10 In the north the same day also marks Rāma’s victory over Rāvaṇa, and is called Dussehra.7
The music under this page is Anukriti Radio’s Aigiri Nandini, the Mahiṣāsuramardinī Stotram: a later devotional hymn, traditionally attributed to Ādi Śaṅkara, that retells the Devī Māhātmya’s battles rather than belonging to it.12 The track opens on a call of Jai Mata Di and the first verse, then turns to the ninth, where the women of heaven dance to the drum: tatheyi, tatheyi.11
O daughter of the mountain, who gladdens the earth, who delights the whole world, praised by Nandin; dwelling on the crest of the Vindhya, best of mountains; joy of Viṣṇu, praised by Indra; O Goddess, wife of the blue-throated Śiva, mother of a vast family, doer of great deeds: victory, victory to you, slayer of Mahiṣāsura, with your lovely braided hair, daughter of the mountain.
Every verse of the hymn ends on that same line, and its last word is śailasute: daughter of the mountain. It is Śailaputrī’s name in another form. Ten days on, the festival’s song of victory comes back to the goddess of the first night.
Aṣṭamī in Bengal
Flowers in folded hands
In Bengal the same nights are Durgā Pūjā, and their centre is Mahā Aṣṭamī: in 2026, Monday 19 October in Kolkata.8 That is the day for anjali. Flowers, and bel leaves if there are any, are held in folded hands and offered at the Goddess’s feet three times, while the priest leads a different mantra for each offering.13 Our guide to pushpanjali and the flowers of puja follows the offering from Durgā’s hibiscus to Śiva’s bilva.
Every mantra on this page opens with the same syllable. Why ॐ is drawn as one sign in Devanagari but spelled as a word in Tamil is its own story, told in One Sound, Two Hands. For what a mantra is in the first place, start with The Sacred Power of Mantras, and for how families across India hand chanting down at home, read Ummachi.
One thing to listen for as you chant: each name here ends in a dative, the ending that means “to her”. Śailaputryai, Kātyāyanyai, Skandamātre. Swallow the ending and the salutation loses its object. Anukriti listens as you chant and tells you, line by line, where a syllable slipped.
Quick answers
What is the mantra for each day of Navratri?
Each day has a short salutation to that day’s form of Durgā. Day 1: ॐ देवी शैलपुत्र्यै नमः (Om Devi Shailaputryai Namah). Day 2: ॐ देवी ब्रह्मचारिण्यै नमः (Om Devi Brahmacharinyai Namah). Day 3: ॐ देवी चन्द्रघण्टायै नमः (Om Devi Chandraghantayai Namah). Day 4: ॐ देवी कूष्माण्डायै नमः (Om Devi Kushmandayai Namah). Day 5: ॐ देवी स्कन्दमात्रे नमः (Om Devi Skandamatre Namah). Day 6: ॐ देवी कात्यायन्यै नमः (Om Devi Katyayanyai Namah). Day 7: ॐ देवी कालरात्र्यै नमः (Om Devi Kalaratryai Namah). Day 8: ॐ देवी महागौर्यै नमः (Om Devi Mahagauryai Namah). Day 9: ॐ देवी सिद्धिदात्र्यै नमः (Om Devi Siddhidatryai Namah). Many households also chant the Navārṇa mantra, ॐ ऐं ह्रीं क्लीं चामुण्डायै विच्चे, on all nine days.
When is Navratri 2026?
Sharad Navratri 2026 begins with Ghatasthapana on Sunday 11 October. Saptami runs across two sunrises this year, so Durga Ashtami and Maha Navami are both kept on Monday 19 October in the New Delhi panchang, with Sandhi Puja late that morning. Vijayadashami (Dussehra) is Tuesday 20 October; Bengal keeps Vijayadashami on Wednesday 21 October.
What is the Navratri Day 1 mantra?
Day 1 (Sunday 11 October 2026) honours Shailputri. Her mantra is ॐ देवी शैलपुत्र्यै नमः (Om Devi Shailaputryai Namah), and her verse begins वन्दे वाञ्छितलाभाय चन्द्रार्धकृतशेखराम् (vande vāñchitalābhāya candrārdhakṛtaśekharām): “For the gaining of what I wish, I bow to her who wears the half-moon as her crest.”
Which verse names all nine goddesses of Navratri?
Verses 3 to 5 of the Devī Kavacham, recited with the Durgā Saptaśatī, name the nine forms in order: prathamaṃ śailaputrīti dvitīyaṃ brahmacāriṇī, tṛtīyaṃ candraghaṇṭeti kūṣmāṇḍeti caturthakam, and so on to navamaṃ siddhidātrī ca navadurgāḥ prakīrtitāḥ: “these are proclaimed the nine Durgās.”
What are the Navratri 2026 colours?
For Sharad Navratri 2026, Drik Panchang and Prokerala list the same nine: Day 1 orange, Day 2 white, Day 3 red, Day 4 royal blue, Day 5 yellow, Day 6 green, Day 7 grey, Day 8 purple, Day 9 peacock green. The colours are a modern custom and change from year to year.
