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This article examines the transmission history of the [[Quran]]. The perfect preservation of the Quran is an article of faith for most schools and sects of Islam and figures highly in the beliefs of Muslims around the divine nature of their religion. Orthodox Islamic scholars argue that the Qur'an today is identical to that received by Prophet [[Muhammad]]. This contention however is challenged both by parts of the Islamic tradition itself and the findings of modern scholarship.

Before Caliph [[Uthman_ibn_Affan|Uthman]] standardised the Quranic consonantal text (QCT) around 650 CE, large numbers of variants later documented by Muslim scholars were read by various companions of Muhammad, often differing in whole words and phrases. Academic experts have found material support for such reports in some of the oldest Quran manuscripts. There are also hadith reports that substantial numbers of verses had already been lost. The fear of permanently losing verses is said to have motivated the initial collection of the Qur'an under Caliph [[Abu_Bakr_Abdullah_ibn_Uthman|Abu Bakr]]. Notwithstanding a number of scribal errors during the initial copying process, Uthman was essentially successful in stabilising the QCT, or rasm. However, due to limitations in the early stage of Arabic orthography in use at that time, a wide variety of oral readings (qira'at) within this standardised rasm was possible. This continued until the oral readings too were stabilised over centuries and orthography developed to more fully document them. Tens of thousands of variants are attributed to readers of the first couple of centuries, which include Muhammad's companions and early reciters, within and outside the standard rasm, besides those found in the ten canonical readings and their transmitters. The vast majority of recitation and printed Qurans in use today are based on the transmission of Hafs from the reading of 'Asim.