The basic text families from which the literal translations have been derived are the same for the KJV and the NKJV and are known as Byzantine. More recent versions are based on the Alexandrine text which was not available when the KJV was originally translated. There have been numerous discussions by many scholars about which original text is most accurate.

The Alexandrine text family was hidden away and untouched for several hundred years while the Byzantine texts were copied and recopied during those centuries. However, the end result is two families of texts that vary little in their actual communicative content. Certainly, there are variances in capitalization, punctuation, spellings, etc. However, the Biblical truth is sound and consistent in both text families. While the Byzantine text is considered to be "fuller," most of its fullness appears due to such things as restatements of thoughts and fuller names for Christ (e.g., Lord Jesus Christ).