The Grihya Sutras, which provide rules for domestic rites, are one of the earliest mentioned of the Pūjā. These sutras, dated about 500 BC, use the word puja to describe the hospitality of departed ancestors in memory of priests invited to his residence.
The basic principle of puja remained the same as in Vedic times but was extended to accept the deity as one honorary member, alongside the divine nature of the deity. Puranic literary corpus, dating back to the 6th CE, includes detailed explanations of how the Deity puja will work.
Deity puja thus incorporates Vedic rituals with the ceremonial devotion to deity. The preference of Vedic puja as well as the devotional deity puja remained, like many other aspects of Hinduism.
Like Vedic pujas, the deity pujas have switched from requests and outward goals towards the awareness of communion with deities and their divine nature. The end result of it was to be God consciousness through homage to God. It was a form of Yoga.
However, even with this theoretical meaning, puja was still a vehicle for requesting wishes and appeals, for instance, for good health of one's own child, a swift recovery from illness, a success in risk imagined and the like. The Mantras and Rituals in the structure and practice of pujas concentrate on spirituality and only at the end of puja are all petitions and appeals answered.
Puja in temple is more elaborate and usually produces several times a day than the domestic versions. The pujari(priest) also performs them.