How to Perform Wudu: Step by Step, With the Duas and What Breaks It

Before every prayer, a Muslim washes in a set way: the hands, the mouth and nose, the face, the arms, the head, the ears and the feet. This washing is called wudu (wuḍūʾ), or ablution. Without it the prayer isn't valid, and done well it is an act of worship in its own right.

This guide covers where wudu comes from in the Quran, how the Prophet ﷺ performed it, the duas before and after, what breaks it, wiping over socks, and the questions people most often ask. Where the four Sunni schools of law (Hanafi, Maliki, Shafi'i and Hanbali) differ, the differences are set out side by side. Follow the school you were taught, and ask a scholar you trust when something isn't clear.

Why wudu matters

The Prophet ﷺ said: "Allah does not accept a prayer without purification" (Sahih Muslim 224). In another hadith, the prayer of someone who has broken their wudu "is not accepted until he performs wudu" (Sahih al-Bukhari 135; Sahih Muslim 225).

Wudu is more than a condition for the prayer. The Prophet ﷺ said that "purification is half of faith" (Sahih Muslim 223), and the Quran says that Allah loves those who keep themselves pure:

إِنَّ ٱللَّهَ يُحِبُّ ٱلتَّوَّٰبِينَ وَيُحِبُّ ٱلۡمُتَطَهِّرِينَ

Indeed, Allāh loves those who are constantly repentant and loves those who purify themselves. (Al-Baqarah 2:222)

Repentance and purification come together again in the dua said after wudu, as we'll see.

The verse that commands wudu

Wudu is commanded in Surah Al-Ma'idah:

يَٰٓأَيُّهَا ٱلَّذِينَ ءَامَنُوٓاْ إِذَا قُمۡتُمۡ إِلَى ٱلصَّلَوٰةِ فَٱغۡسِلُواْ وُجُوهَكُمۡ وَأَيۡدِيَكُمۡ إِلَى ٱلۡمَرَافِقِ وَٱمۡسَحُواْ بِرُءُوسِكُمۡ وَأَرۡجُلَكُمۡ إِلَى ٱلۡكَعۡبَيۡنِ

O you who have believed, when you rise to [perform] prayer, wash your faces and your forearms to the elbows and wipe over your heads and wash your feet to the ankles. (Al-Ma'idah 5:6)

The verse names four acts, and all four schools agree they are obligatory (farḍ):

• Washing the face. The face runs from where the hair normally starts on the forehead to below the chin, and from one earlobe to the other.
• Washing the arms up to the elbows. The Arabic ilā ("to") is understood by almost all scholars to include the elbows, because the Prophet ﷺ washed them. Abū Hurayrah, describing the Prophet's wudu, washed his arms until the washing reached his upper arms (Sahih Muslim 246).
• Wiping the head. Wiping (masḥ) means passing wet hands over it, not pouring water. How much of the head must be wiped is one of the differences between the schools.
• Washing the feet up to the ankles, the ankles included, for the same reason as the elbows.

The rest of the verse covers the major washing (ghusl) and dry ablution (tayammum), which we'll come back to.

What else is obligatory, school by school

Each school adds to those four acts from the hadith. This table is a summary; the books of each school give the details.

	Hanafi	Maliki	Shafi'i	Hanbali
The four acts in 5:6	Obligatory	Obligatory	Obligatory	Obligatory
Intention (niyyah)	Sunnah: wudu without it is valid but earns no reward	Obligatory	Obligatory	Condition of validity
Keeping the order (tartīb)	Sunnah	Sunnah	Obligatory	Obligatory
No long gaps between steps (muwālāt)	Sunnah	Obligatory when you remember	Sunnah	Obligatory
Rubbing the limbs (dalk)	Sunnah	Obligatory	Sunnah	Sunnah
Rinsing the mouth and nose	Sunnah in wudu (obligatory in ghusl)	Sunnah	Sunnah	Obligatory, as part of the face
How much of the head to wipe	A quarter	All of it	Any part, even a little	All of it, with the ears
Saying Bismillah	Sunnah	Recommended	Sunnah	Obligatory when you remember it

If you follow every step below, in order and without a long break, your wudu is valid in all four schools.

The steps at a glance

The way of making wudu below follows ʿUthmān ibn ʿAffān's description of the Prophet's wudu (Sahih al-Bukhari 159; Sahih Muslim 226) and ʿAbdullāh ibn Zayd's (Sahih al-Bukhari 185; Sahih Muslim 235). Tap a step to read about it.

1. 1Intention and BismillahIn the heart
2. 2Hands to the wrists3 times
3. 3Rinse the mouth3 times
4. 4Rinse the nose3 times
5. 5Wash the face3 times
6. 6Arms to the elbows3 times, right first
7. 7Wipe the headOnce, wet hands
8. 8Wipe the earsOnce
9. 9Feet to the ankles3 times, right first
10. 10The dua after wuduThe shahada

Before you start

• Use clean water. Ordinary water from a tap, a well, rain, the sea or a river is fine. Water that has changed into something else, like tea or juice, can't be used.
• Use the toilet first if you need to, since relieving yourself breaks wudu.
• Remove anything that stops water reaching the skin. Nail polish, waterproof make-up, thick paint and glue all block water, so wudu made over them isn't valid. Henna and ordinary hair dye only colour the skin and don't block it. Move a tight ring so water gets under it.
• Don't waste water. The Prophet ﷺ made wudu with a mudd, about two-thirds of a litre (Sahih al-Bukhari 201; Sahih Muslim 325). A tap left running uses many times that.
• Use a miswak or toothbrush if you can. The Prophet ﷺ said that if it would not have been too hard on his Ummah, he would have ordered them to use the miswak with every wudu (reported by Mālik and Aḥmad, and by al-Bukhari without a chain).

How to perform wudu, step by step

1. Make the intention, and say Bismillah

Intend in your heart that you are making wudu to purify yourself for prayer. The intention is in the heart and doesn't need to be said aloud. The Prophet ﷺ said: "Actions are only by intentions" (Sahih al-Bukhari 1).

Then say:

بِسۡمِ ٱللَّهِ

Bismillāh. In the name of Allah.

A hadith says "there is no wudu for one who does not mention the name of Allah over it" (Abu Dawud 101; al-Tirmidhi 25; Ibn Majah 399). Scholars differ on its strength, which is why most count Bismillah as sunnah, while the Hanbali school makes it obligatory when you remember it. If you are in a bathroom with a toilet, many scholars say to say it in your heart, or before going in.

2. Wash your hands to the wrists, three times

Pour water over your right hand, then your left, and wash both hands up to the wrists, passing water between the fingers. ʿUthmān began his description of the Prophet's wudu by pouring water over his hands three times.

If you have just woken up, wash your hands before dipping them into a bowl or basin of water. The Prophet ﷺ said: "When one of you wakes from sleep, let him not put his hand into the vessel until he has washed it three times, for he does not know where his hand spent the night" (Sahih al-Bukhari 162; Sahih Muslim 278).

3. Rinse your mouth, three times

Take water into your mouth with your right hand, swirl it around and spit it out. Do this three times. If you are not fasting, move the water around well, as far as the back of the mouth.

4. Rinse your nose, three times

Sniff water into your nose with your right hand, and blow it out using your left hand. Do this three times. The Prophet ﷺ told Laqīṭ ibn Ṣabirah: "Sniff the water deeply into the nose, unless you are fasting" (Abu Dawud 142; al-Tirmidhi 788).

You can rinse the mouth and nose from the same handful, as in ʿAbdullāh ibn Zayd's description (Sahih al-Bukhari 191), or use fresh water for each, which the Hanafi school prefers.

5. Wash your face, three times

Wash your whole face, from the hairline down to below the chin, and from one earlobe to the other. Make sure water reaches the sides of the face near the ears and the area under the chin.

If you have a thin beard, wash the skin underneath. If your beard is thick, washing its surface is enough, and it is sunnah to run your wet fingers through it (takhlīl), as the Prophet ﷺ did (al-Tirmidhi 31).

6. Wash your arms to the elbows, three times, right first

Wash your right arm from the fingertips up to and including the elbow, three times, then your left arm the same way. ʿĀʾishah said the Prophet ﷺ liked to start with the right in putting on his shoes, combing his hair and purifying himself, and in all his affairs (Sahih al-Bukhari 168; Sahih Muslim 268).

The elbow and the back of the arm are the parts most often missed, so check them.

7. Wipe your head, once

Wet your hands. Place them on the front of your head, pass them back to the nape of your neck, then bring them back to where you started. This is how ʿAbdullāh ibn Zayd described the Prophet's wiping of the head (Sahih al-Bukhari 185; Sahih Muslim 235). Wiping once is the sunnah; the head is not washed or wiped three times.

How much of the head is obligatory differs between the schools (see the table above), but wiping the whole head as described is valid in all of them.

Women with long hair wipe over the hair on the head; the hair hanging below doesn't need to be wiped. If you wear a headscarf, most scholars say to wipe the hair itself, so slip your wet hand under the front of the scarf. Some Hanbali scholars allow wiping over a scarf that is wrapped under the chin and hard to remove.

8. Wipe your ears, once

With wet fingers, wipe the inside of your ears with your index fingers and the back of them with your thumbs. There is a hadith that "the ears are part of the head" (Ibn Majah 443), so the Hanafi and Hanbali schools wipe them with the water left from wiping the head, while the Shafi'i and Maliki schools take fresh water.

Hanafi books describe wiping the back of the neck with the backs of the fingers as recommended. Many hadith scholars say there is no authentic report of the Prophet ﷺ doing this, so other schools don't include it.

9. Wash your feet to the ankles, three times, right first

Wash your right foot up to and including the ankle, three times, then your left. Pass water between your toes with your little finger, as the Prophet ﷺ did (Abu Dawud 148; al-Tirmidhi 40).

Pay attention to the heels. The Prophet ﷺ saw people whose heels were still dry after wudu and called out: "Woe to the heels from the Fire!" (Sahih al-Bukhari 60; Sahih Muslim 241).

10. Say the dua after wudu

When you finish, say the shahada:

أَشۡهَدُ أَنۡ لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا ٱللَّهُ وَحۡدَهُ لَا شَرِيكَ لَهُ، وَأَشۡهَدُ أَنَّ مُحَمَّدًا عَبۡدُهُ وَرَسُولُهُ

Ashhadu an lā ilāha illā-llāhu waḥdahū lā sharīka lah, wa ashhadu anna Muḥammadan ʿabduhū wa rasūluh. I bear witness that there is no god but Allah alone, with no partner, and I bear witness that Muhammad is His servant and Messenger.

The Prophet ﷺ said that whoever makes wudu well and then says this, the eight gates of Paradise are opened for him, and he may enter by whichever he wishes (Sahih Muslim 234).

Al-Tirmidhi's narration adds (al-Tirmidhi 55):

ٱللَّهُمَّ ٱجۡعَلۡنِي مِنَ ٱلتَّوَّابِينَ وَٱجۡعَلۡنِي مِنَ ٱلۡمُتَطَهِّرِينَ

Allāhumma-jʿalnī mina-t-tawwābīn, wa-jʿalnī mina-l-mutaṭahhirīn. O Allah, make me among those who repent often, and make me among those who purify themselves.

These are the same two words, al-tawwābīn and al-mutaṭahhirīn, that Allah uses in 2:222 for the people He loves. Another dua, reported by al-Nasa'i, is:

سُبۡحَانَكَ ٱللَّهُمَّ وَبِحَمۡدِكَ، أَشۡهَدُ أَنۡ لَا إِلَٰهَ إِلَّا أَنۡتَ، أَسۡتَغۡفِرُكَ وَأَتُوبُ إِلَيۡكَ

Subḥānaka-llāhumma wa biḥamdik, ashhadu an lā ilāha illā ant, astaghfiruka wa atūbu ilayk. Glory be to You, O Allah, and praise. I bear witness that there is no god but You. I seek Your forgiveness and turn to You in repentance.

Then pray two rak'ahs

After describing the Prophet's wudu, ʿUthmān reported that he ﷺ said: "Whoever performs wudu like this wudu of mine, then prays two rak'ahs in which he does not let his mind wander, his past sins are forgiven" (Sahih al-Bukhari 159). These two rak'ahs are often called taḥiyyat al-wuḍūʾ. The Prophet ﷺ once asked Bilāl what deed he hoped most from, because he had heard Bilāl's footsteps ahead of him in Paradise. Bilāl said that whenever he made wudu, by night or day, he prayed with it whatever he was able to (Sahih al-Bukhari 1149; Sahih Muslim 2458).

At night, these can be the start of Tahajjud.

Common mistakes

• Leaving dry spots. The heels, the elbows, the edges of the face near the ears and the area between the fingers and toes are easy to miss. The Prophet ﷺ saw a man with a dry patch the size of a fingernail on his foot and told him to go back and do his wudu well (Sahih Muslim 243).
• Washing more than three times. Three is the most. Once, if every part is fully washed, is valid, and the Prophet ﷺ sometimes washed once or twice. After washing three times, he said that whoever does more has done wrong and transgressed (Abu Dawud 135; al-Nasa'i 140).
• Saying the intention out loud, or worrying that it wasn't "said" properly. Intending in your heart is enough.
• Repeating wudu out of doubt. Constant doubts about whether a part was washed, or whether wudu was broken, are a known form of waswasah (whispering from Shayṭān). The rule for doubt is below.

What breaks wudu

Points all the schools agree on

• Anything that leaves the front or back passage, such as urine, stool or wind. The verse mentions coming "from the place of relieving himself", and Abū Hurayrah explained breaking wudu as "wind, with or without sound" (Sahih al-Bukhari 135).
• Deep sleep, in which you lose awareness. Light dozing while sitting firmly doesn't break wudu: the Companions would doze while waiting for ʿIshāʾ, then pray without renewing their wudu (Sahih Muslim 376).
• Losing your mind or consciousness, by fainting, intoxication or madness.
• Whatever requires ghusl, such as sexual intercourse, ejaculation, and the end of menstruation or post-natal bleeding. These need a full ghusl, which includes wudu.

Where the schools differ

	Hanafi	Maliki	Shafi'i	Hanbali
Blood or pus flowing from a wound	Breaks wudu	Doesn't	Doesn't	Breaks it if the amount is large
Vomiting a mouthful	Breaks wudu	Doesn't	Doesn't	Breaks it if the amount is large
Touching your private parts with the palm	Doesn't	Breaks it	Breaks it	Breaks it
Skin-to-skin touch with the opposite sex (not a close relative)	Doesn't	Breaks it if with desire	Breaks it	Breaks it if with desire
Laughing out loud in prayer	Breaks wudu and the prayer	Breaks only the prayer	Breaks only the prayer	Breaks only the prayer
Eating camel meat	Doesn't	Doesn't	Doesn't	Breaks it

The differences come from different hadith and different readings of the same verse. The Shafi'i position on touching comes from "or you have contacted women" in 5:6, which they read literally, while the Hanafis read it as meaning intercourse and cite ʿĀʾishah's report that the Prophet ﷺ kissed one of his wives and then prayed without renewing his wudu (Abu Dawud 179). The Hanbali position on camel meat comes from a hadith in which the Prophet ﷺ was asked whether to make wudu after eating it and said yes (Sahih Muslim 360). On touching the private parts, the majority follow Busrah bint Ṣafwān's report (Abu Dawud 181) and the Hanafis follow Ṭalq ibn ʿAlī's (Abu Dawud 182).

Things that don't break wudu

Eating and drinking (apart from camel meat for Hanbalis), cutting your hair or nails, seeing someone's ʿawrah, swearing or backbiting (sins, but they don't break wudu), and getting undressed. Many scholars recommend renewing wudu after anger or after saying something bad, but it isn't required.

If you're not sure whether your wudu has broken

Stay with what you were sure of. The Prophet ﷺ said that if someone feels something in his stomach and isn't sure whether anything came out, he should not leave the mosque unless he hears a sound or notices a smell (Sahih Muslim 362). Scholars took a general rule from this: certainty isn't removed by doubt. If you know you made wudu and doubt whether it broke, you still have wudu. If you know it broke and doubt whether you renewed it, you don't.

Wiping over socks

Instead of washing the feet, you can wipe over leather socks (khuffayn), a practice reported from the Prophet ﷺ by many Companions, among them al-Mughīrah ibn Shuʿbah (Sahih al-Bukhari 203; Sahih Muslim 274).

• Put them on after a full wudu, with the feet washed.
• Time limit: a day and a night (24 hours) if you are at home, and three days and nights (72 hours) if you are travelling (Sahih Muslim 276). Most scholars count from the first time your wudu breaks after putting them on.
• How: with wet fingers, wipe once over the top of each foot, from the toes towards the shin. The bottom isn't wiped. ʿAlī said that if the religion were by opinion, the bottom of the sock would be more deserving of wiping than the top, but he had seen the Messenger of Allah ﷺ wipe over the top (Abu Dawud 162).
• It ends when the time is up, when you take the socks off, or when you need a ghusl.

What about ordinary socks? This is a real difference of opinion. Classical Hanafi, Maliki and Shafi'i scholars only allow wiping over leather socks, or socks thick enough to walk in without shoes, that don't let water through and stay up by themselves. The Hanbali school, and many scholars today, allow wiping over ordinary cloth socks, citing reports that the Prophet ﷺ and Companions wiped over jawrabayn (cloth socks), such as Abu Dawud 159, whose authenticity is debated. If you follow the Hanafi school, thin cotton or nylon socks aren't enough.

Bandages, casts and wounds

If a part of the body that must be washed is injured and washing it would cause harm, wash everything else and wipe over the bandage or cast (jabīrah) with a wet hand instead. This is based on reports from the Companions and a hadith about a man with a head wound (Abu Dawud 336), whose chain is weak. The Shafi'i school also asks you to do tayammum alongside. If even wiping would cause harm, you can leave that part.

Common questions

Does a shower or ghusl count as wudu?

A ghusl done to remove major impurity also counts as wudu. ʿĀʾishah said the Prophet ﷺ did not make wudu after ghusl (al-Tirmidhi 107). It is still sunnah to begin the ghusl with wudu.

An ordinary shower is different. For Hanafis, intention isn't a condition, so if every part of wudu is washed in the shower, including rinsing the mouth and nose, you have wudu. The other schools require the intention, so you would need to intend wudu while showering and, for the Shafi'i and Hanbali schools, wash the parts in order.

Do I need wudu to read the Quran?

To touch a printed copy of the Quran (a muṣḥaf), all four schools say you need wudu. They cite 56:79, "None touch it except the purified", and the Prophet's letter to ʿAmr ibn Ḥazm, "None should touch the Quran except one who is pure" (Muwaṭṭaʾ of Mālik). Many commentators say the verse is about the angels, but the schools hold the ruling from the letter and the Companions' practice.

Reciting from memory doesn't need wudu. Reading from a phone or tablet is a newer question; many scholars today say touching a screen isn't touching a muṣḥaf, so wudu isn't required, though it is better to have it.

Do I need a new wudu for every prayer?

No. One wudu lasts until it breaks. On the day Makkah was opened, the Prophet ﷺ prayed several prayers with one wudu (Sahih Muslim 277). Renewing your wudu for each prayer is still a recommended practice, and was his usual habit.

What if I can't stop bleeding, or have incontinence?

Someone with a condition that keeps breaking their wudu, like continuous bleeding, incontinence or constant wind, makes wudu after the prayer time begins and prays with it, even if the condition continues. The basis is the Prophet's ruling for a woman with irregular bleeding (istiḥāḍah), who was told to make wudu for each prayer (Sahih al-Bukhari 228). In the Hanafi and Hanbali schools the wudu lasts until the prayer time ends; in the Shafi'i school it covers one obligatory prayer.

I forgot a step. Is my wudu valid?

If you missed one of the obligatory parts, go back and do it, and in the schools that require order, redo the steps after it too. If you missed a sunnah, like rinsing the nose, your wudu is valid in most schools. If you realise after praying that you missed an obligatory part, redo your wudu and the prayer.

What if there is no water?

When there is no water, or using it would harm you because of illness or severe cold, you do tayammum, which the same verse allows: strike clean earth or dust with your hands, then wipe your face and hands (5:6; 4:43). The Prophet ﷺ showed ʿAmmār ibn Yāsir how, striking the ground once and wiping his face and hands (Sahih al-Bukhari 338; Sahih Muslim 368). The Hanafi and Shafi'i schools strike twice, once for the face and once for the arms up to the elbows. Tayammum breaks for the same reasons as wudu, and also when water becomes available.

The reward of wudu

The Prophet ﷺ described wudu as washing away sins. When a Muslim washes his face, every sin he looked at with his eyes leaves with the water, or with the last drop of water; when he washes his hands, every sin his hands did leaves with the water; and when he washes his feet, every sin his feet walked to leaves with the water, until he comes out cleansed of sins (Sahih Muslim 244). In ʿUthmān's narration, the sins leave the body "even from under the nails" (Sahih Muslim 245).

On the Day of Judgement, the Prophet ﷺ will recognise his Ummah by the light on the parts they washed: "My Ummah will be called on the Day of Resurrection with shining faces, hands and feet from the traces of wudu" (Sahih al-Bukhari 136; Sahih Muslim 246).

And he ﷺ asked his Companions: "Shall I not tell you of something by which Allah erases sins and raises ranks?" They said yes. He said: "Performing wudu well when it is hard, taking many steps to the mosques, and waiting for the next prayer after the prayer. That is the ribāṭ" (Sahih Muslim 251), the guarding of a frontier.

Wudu takes a few minutes, five times a day. Done with attention, it turns the moments before each prayer into a reminder of what the prayer is for.