Dragon Ball Daima release date revealed – and there’s more good news

Dragon Ball Daima, the highly-anticipated return of Goku and the X Fighters to the small screen, finally has a premiere date.

Dragon Ball Daima is easily one of the biggest upcoming anime of the year. Goku and his pals haven’t been in an anime show since 2018 (yes, that’s how long it’s been since Dragon Ball Super ended), and Akira Toriyama’s untimely death has only made the excitement stronger.

Since Daima was announced in 2023, we’ve had a steady drip of details, and now we’ve got the release date. Dragon Ball Daima kicks off on October 11, 2024 in Japan with an extended episode, and the whole season is already in the can.

The news comes from Fuji Television, the TV show’s broadcaster in Japan. Episode 1 will be 10 minutes longer than the rest of the season, and “All episodes of Dragon Ball DAIMA are done,” according to Nakajima Yuichi, Programming Director.

That second part is unusual for the industry. Anime and manga are typically produced to pretty tight deadlines, often causing delays, breaks, and hiatuses among creative teams and studios. One Piece takes a break every few weeks, and shows such as My Hero Academia and Jujutsu Kaisen usually have a split somewhere in any given season.

All of Daima being done lessens the risk of there being any delay, outside of public holidays and such. It’s also an indication the team behind it were given ample time and resources to get the job done, something that should be more commonplace.

Watching Daima will be bittersweet, since it’s the last work Akira Toriyama has contributed to the franchise. The production, featuring Goku, Vegeta, and company transformed into childlike versions of themselves by some mysterious entity, takes place before Super in the overall timeline, so it should be more comedic in tone.

We’ll see in October. Check out our guides on Dandadan and Lazarus for other releases on the way.