Within the tradition that venerates the Divine Mother through the Devi Bhagavata Purana, scholars speak of two broad manuscript families, often called the northern and southern recensions. Both transmit a work of twelve skandhas devoted to the same overarching vision of the Goddess as supreme, yet they diverge in several technical and textual respects. One of the clearest differences lies in the chaptering: the northern recension is described as having 12 skandhas and 318 chapters, while the southern recension has 12 skandhas and 309 chapters, the disparity arising from the splitting or combining of episodes. This variation in adhyāya division naturally affects chapter numbering, even when the narrative substance remains parallel.

Beyond chapter counts, there are differences in the distribution and wording of verses. Both recensions share the same basic stories and theology, but individual verses, hymns, and narrative details can be slightly longer, shorter, or phrased differently in one tradition than in the other. Some verses or short passages appear only in northern manuscripts or only in southern ones, with such variation especially noticeable in more liturgical or ritual sections. These are not wholesale doctrinal shifts so much as the subtle fingerprints of distinct regional lineages of transmission.

The ritual and Tantric materials embedded in the text also show nuanced regional coloring. Both recensions are strongly Śākta and Tantric in orientation, yet the southern manuscripts are said to preserve more expanded details on pūjā-vidhi, homa, and related procedures, while the northern tradition can be relatively more concise in some of these prescriptions or transmit slightly different versions of the same rites. Colophons at the end of chapters and skandhas likewise differ in wording, sometimes naming different places or reciters, or offering liturgical blessings that are longer in one recension than the other.

Even at the level of language and style, the two streams bear the marks of their respective cultural soils. The Sanskrit of the southern recension is often characterized as somewhat more classical or grammatically smooth, whereas the northern recension occasionally exhibits simpler forms, variant readings, or regionally inflected proper names. Yet despite these many variations in surface detail—chaptering, verse readings, ritual elaboration, and stylistic nuance—both recensions are recognized as transmitting the same fundamental scripture of the Divine Mother. The heart of the text, its portrayal of Devī as the supreme reality and source of all, remains shared, while the differences reveal how living traditions shape and are shaped by the lands through which they flow.