Shuja Shah Durrani (also known as Shāh Shujāʻ, Shah Shujah, Shoja Shah, Shujah al-Mulk) (4 November 1785 – 5 April 1842) was ruler of the Durrani Empire from 1803 to 1809. He then ruled from 1839 until his death in 1842. Shuja Shah was of the Sadozai line of the Abdali group of Pashtuns. He became the fifth Emir of Afghanistan.

Shuja Shah was the governor of Herat and Peshawar from 1798 to 1801. He proclaimed himself as King of Afghanistan in October 1801 (after the deposition of his brother Zaman Shah), but only properly ascended to the throne on July 13, 1803. In Afghanistan, a blind man by tradition cannot be Emir, and so Shujah who was too tender hearted to have his brother Zaman killed, instead had him blinded as Shujah's surgeon with "delicate skill" used a lancet to pull out his eyes. After coming to power in 1803, Shuja ended the "blood feud" with the powerful Barakzai family and also forgave them. To create an alliance with them, he married "their sister" Wa'fa Begum.

Shuja allied Afghanistan with the United Kingdom in 1809, as a means of defending against an invasion of Afghanistan and India by Russia. In 1809, a British diplomatic mission was sent to Afghanistan, which at time was to the British a remote and mysterious part of Asia. According to Mountstuart Elphinstone, "The King of Kabul [Shah Shuja] was a handsome man". He also wrote "of an olive complexion with a thick black beard.....his voice clear, his address princely." Shuja wore the Koh-i-Noor diamond in one of his bracelets when Elphinstone visited him.William Fraser, who accompanied Elphinstone to meet Shah Shuhah was "struck with the dignity of his appearance and the romantic Oriental awe..." Fraser also "judged" him to be "about five feet six inches tall" and his skin colour was "very fair, but dead...his beard was thick jet black and shortened a little by the obliquely upwards, but turned again at the corners....The eyelashes and the edges of his eyelids were blackened with antimony". He also described Shuja's voice as "loud and sonorous".

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