What is the du'a for waking up?

The du'a

الْحَمْدُ لِلَّهِ الَّذِي أَحْيَانَا بَعْدَ مَا أَمَاتَنَا وَإِلَيْهِ النُّشُورُ"All praise is for Allah who gave us life after having taken it from us, and unto Him is the resurrection."— Sahih al-Bukhari 6312, from Hudhayfah

What the words carry

The du'a treats sleep as a small death and waking as a small resurrection, and that is the whole point of its wording. Allah "took" your soul while you slept — the Qur'anic sense of wafat — and He returned it to you this morning. So the first thing the tongue does is not ask for anything; it thanks.

• "Alhamdulillah" — praise belongs to Allah, stated as a fact before it is a feeling. You begin the day by attributing your waking to its actual cause.
• "Alladhi ahyana" — the One who gave us life. Not "who woke me", but who gave life, the same gift He gives after death.
• "Ba'da ma amatana" — after He had caused us to die. Sleep is named as death, which is why the Prophet ﷺ said "Bismika amutu wa ahya" when lying down.
• "Wa ilayhi an-nushur" — and to Him is the rising. The morning's rising is a rehearsal for the one that matters.

When to say it

The narration places it at the moment of waking, before anything else. In the versions from Hudhayfah and Abu Dharr, the Prophet ﷺ said it "when he woke" or "when he got up" — the du'a belongs to the first conscious moment, not to after you have dressed or left the bed.

The other du'a for waking

A second wording is reported in the same chapter, and it is the one many people know from the Hisn al-Muslim collection:

"Alhamdulillahi alladhi 'afani fi jasadi, wa radda 'alayya ruhi, wa adhina li bidhikrih""Praise to Allah who gave my body health, returned my soul to me, and permitted me to remember Him."— Sa'id ibn Ali ibn Wahf al-Qahtani, Hisn al-Muslim, the adhkar for waking

Where the first du'a looks at the resurrection, this one looks at the three gifts you are holding right now: a body that works, a soul returned, and permission to remember Him. Both are reported for the same occasion, and saying either fulfils the Sunnah.

What waking up also asks of you

The Sunnah attaches one action to waking that is not a du'a at all. The Prophet ﷺ said:

"When one of you wakes from his sleep, let him not dip his hand into his vessel until he has washed it three times, for he does not know where his hand spent the night."— agreed upon, reported by al-Bukhari and Muslim

Shaykh Ibn al-'Uthaymeen رحمه الله explained that these three washings are for cleaning the hand, not part of wudu — they come before it, because the hand is the tool that takes and pours the water. If a person skipped them and washed his face directly, his wudu would still be valid. Shaykh al-Rajhi notes that the obligation is specific to waking from night sleep, since the narration speaks of where the hand "spent the night"; waking from a daytime nap, washing three times is recommended rather than required.

Key takeaways

• The Sunnah du'a for waking is "Alhamdulillahi alladhi ahyana ba'da ma amatana wa ilayhi an-nushur", reported in Sahih al-Bukhari from Hudhayfah and Abu Dharr.
• Say it in the first moment of waking, before you get up or begin anything else.
• A second authentic wording — "Alhamdulillahi alladhi 'afani fi jasadi…" — is also reported for the same moment; either one fulfils the Sunnah.
• On waking from night sleep, wash your hands three times before dipping them into the wudu vessel; this is required for night sleep and recommended after a daytime nap.

Further reading

• Sahih al-Bukhari, the Book of Invocations (Kitab al-Da'awat)
• Sahih Muslim, the Book of Dhikr and Du'a
• Sa'id ibn Ali ibn Wahf al-Qahtani, Hisn al-Muslim

And Allah knows best.