Ganden Monastery, Buddhist monastery on Wangbur Mountain, Lhasa, China.

Ganden Monastery, or Ganden Namgyal Ling, stands on Wangbur Mountain in Dagzê County at 4,300 m, 40 km northeast of Lhasa. Its white-walled buildings with dark red bands and gold-capped roofs descend the slope in irregular tiers. The red-painted lhakang in the centre houses the Tongwa Donden chorten, and the main assembly hall faces a large square.

Je Tsongkhapa Lozang-dragpa (1357–1419), founder of the Gelug order, established Ganden in 1409 and built its main temple with large statues and three-dimensional mandalas. He died there in 1419, and his disciples entombed his preserved body in a silver- and gold-encrusted tomb. The monastery was destroyed after 1959 and shelled by Red Guard artillery in 1966; rebuilding has continued since the 1980s.

The name Gelug abbreviates "Ganden Lug", the Ganden Tradition, and the monastery's head, the Ganden Tripa, leads the Gelug school; by 2003 there had been 99 holders of the office. Monks of the Jangtsey and Shartsey colleges study sutra and tantra through memorisation, logic and debate, earning degrees by examination and public debate. Each year on the 25th day of the tenth Tibetan month, the anniversary of Tsongkhapa's death, the Ganden Ngamchoe lamp festival is held with a daytime thangka display and lamps at night.

The monastery sits at high elevation, so visitors should allow time to acclimate, particularly if arriving from lower altitudes. Access by shuttle bus from Lhasa requires sturdy shoes and weather-appropriate clothing, as mountain conditions can change rapidly.

The reliquary chorten in the red-painted central lhakang, called Tongwa Donden ("Meaningful to Behold"), holds what survived of Tsongkhapa's mummified body: in 1966 Bomi Rinpoche, the monk forced to carry the body to the fire, saved the skull and some ashes. The 14th Dalai Lama took his final degree examination here in 1958.