The standard collection of the Egyptian Book of the Dead contains approximately 190 spells.
The Book of the Dead was not one fixed book but a changing corpus of funerary texts written on papyrus, coffins, shrouds, and amulets. Different manuscripts contained different selections, so no single scroll included every spell. Modern catalogues commonly number about 190 spells, with some scholarly counts reaching 192 as additional texts and variants are identified.
These spells served practical religious purposes for the dead. They could protect the body, restore speech and breath, preserve the heart, provide magical knowledge, identify the deceased with gods, and guide the soul through the Duat, the Egyptian underworld. Spell 125 is especially famous for its description of the Weighing of the Heart before Osiris.
A common mistake is treating the Book of the Dead as a single standardized volume like a modern book. Its contents varied by period, owner, budget, and workshop. The numbering system itself was developed by modern Egyptologists, especially Karl Richard Lepsius in the 19th century.