One Piece: How Old Was Luffy When He Set Sail & Became a Pirate?

Monkey D. Luffy, the protagonist of Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece manga, is known for his many epic adventures. He is one of the best-known anime characters in history, and his adventures are known and followed worldwide. We know that Luffy set off on his adventures on July 22, 1997, when the first manga chapter was released. It has been almost 26 years since that moment, and Luffy is still very active and present in our lives. But how old was Luffy when he actually set sail? We know that he’s wanted to become a pirate since he was a child, but when did his journey start? In this article, we will tell you a bit about Luffy’s journey in One Piece series and how old he was when it all began.

As has been confirmed by Oda in the SBS Volume 4, Monkey D. Luffy was 17 years old when he set sail in East Blue to become a pirate. The youngest we saw him was when he was 7 years old, still just a boy who wants to become a pirate. Ten years later, he actually started his journey, and knowing that he has been on the sea for around two years, we know that he is, at this moment, 19 years of age in the series.

The rest of this article will focus on the chronology of Luffy’s adventures on the sea. Usually, determining the chronology of a manga series is quite difficult, but thanks to Oda and his work, we have some official information that we can work with. This article will contain many spoilers, so be careful if you’re not fully up-to-date with the latest happenings in the series.

What you have to know is that manga timelines are often impossible to map out properly

One general problem with shonen manga, in general, is that they do not follow a real-world timeline. Now, that wouldn’t be an issue were the authors more precise in determining their in-universe timelines, but as they are not, fans usually have trouble pinpointing some moments and determining when some events took place (Naruto is infamously known as an example of this). One Piece is a work that does not really stray away from this formula, and while we do know the general idea of the timeline, a precise determination is basically impossible.

In-universe, we know that there are two calendars and it is important to know that these two calendars provide only a rough outline of the events in the world of One Piece, through which we know that Luffy has been at sea for around two and a half years, but that was obvious from just knowing that we had a two-year time skip in the series. Now that we have told you these general remarks, we can explore Luffy’s journey.

Thanks to Oda and a timeline, we can easily determine Luffy’s age

Now, before we actually provide you with the answer, we have to go back and thanks Reddit user adnaphsaka, who has constructed a timeline of the One Piece series so that you can see how the series has progressed up until the start of the raid on Onigashima. This is important so you understand how long Luffy has been at sea and how his age changed over the course of the series. Here is the timeline:

I tried to go through the Manga…

East Blue Saga : about 15 days, Grand Line : About 77 days, New World : about 41 days

Total : 2 years 134 days or about 2 years and 4 months

** – (didn’t seem to have food to travel for more than a day)

Day 1 : Luffy leaves Fuusha Village

Day 2** : Luffy is sucked into a whirlpool and ends up in Alvida’s base

Day 3** : Luffy and Coby free Zoro

Day 4** : Luffy and Zoro reach Orange town, meet Gaimon

Day 5** : Luffy arrives at Syrup Village

Day 6 : Luffy defeats Kuro

Day 7 : Usopp joins, Strawhats get Merry, Usopp paints the Strawhat Jolly Roger, Strawhats meet Johnny and Yosaku

Day 10 : (Johnny says it takes 2-3 days to reach Baratie) Strawhats reach Baratie

Day 11 : (it says 2 days later) Don Krieg attacks Baratie and is defeated, sanji joins, Nami arrives at Arlong Park, Zoro is captured, Nami frees Zoro, Luffy arrives at Arlong park, Luffy defeats Arlong, party through the night

Day 13 : Cocoyashi village still parties

Day 14 : Luffy leaves Cocoyashi village

Day 15 : Luffy finds out his bounty, Luffy arrives in Loguetown, is almost executed, leaves loguetown

Since entering Grand Line..

Day 1 : Arrive at Twin Capes, get Log Pose, head to Whiskey Peak, reach Whiskey peak at sun down, spend the night at whiskey peak.

Day 2 : Leave Whiskey peak in the morning, arrive at little garden, leave little garden.

Day 5 : (Kureha tells Nami that she had been infected for 3 days) Arrive at Drum kingdom, leave Drum kingdom at night.

Day 10 : (stated that 5 days have passed since leaving Drum kingdom) Meet Bon Clay on their way to Alabasta.

Day 14 (atleast) : (Luffy says its been 4 days since he last ate) Arrive at Alabasta, meet Ace, reach Yuba at night

Day 15 : Leave Yuba in the morning, change plans and head to rainbase.

Day 16 : (Vivi said Rainbase was a day’s walk from Yuba) Reach Rainbase, head for Alubarna, Luffy beats crocodile.

Day 19 : (Vivi says Luffy was sleeping for 3 days) Luffy wakes up, Strawhats leave Alubarna at night to find Merry.

Day 20 : Bid farewell to Vivi and leave Alabasta, find Robin on their ship, a ship falls from the sky, Strawhats head for Jaya, Luffy beats Bellamy.

Day 21 : Strawhats ride the Knock-up Stream to Skypiea, spend the night planning on finding golden city.

Day 22 : Luffy defeats Enel, party at night

Day 23 : Strawhats leave skypiea

Day 24 (maybe) : Strawhats arrive at Long ring Long Land, win the Davy Back fight, lose to Aokiji.

Day 28 : (It says that Luffy and Robin needed to rest for 4 days after being frozen) Strawhats arrive at Water 7, Usopp fights Luffy, Robin tries to assassinate Iceburg at night

Day 29 : Strawhats try to meet Robin at night, face CP9, lose, set out for Enies Lobby

Day 30 : CP9 is defeated, Strawhats bid farewell to Merry.

Day 32 : (It says 2 days since the incident) Franky promises to build Sunny, Luffy meets Garp

Day 35 : (It says 3 days after waiting for Sunny) Strawhats leave Water 7 on board Sunny.

Day 36 (probably) : Strawhats enter thriller bark, beat moria before dawn

Day 37 : Zoro takes Luffy’s pain, Brook joins the crew

Day 39 : (It says 2 days later) Zoro wakes up, Strawhats leave Thriller Bark.

Day 44 (may be) : (It says several days later) Strawhats reach the Red Line, rescue Hacchi, head to Saboady, get sent away by Kuma.

Day 47 : (Sentoumaru says people sent by Kuma fly for 3 days) Luffy arrives at Amazon Lily, fights Boa sisters, parties at night, finds out about Ace’s execution, leaves Amazon Lily at night.

Day 53 : (Gloriosa said Ace was about to be executed in 6 days) Paramount war, Ace dies, Luffy escapes on Law’s submarine

Day 67 : (It says 2 weeks since Paramount war) Luffy wakes up, meets Rayleigh, decides to take a 2 year time skip

Day 72 (may be) : (assuming it takes 5 days to reach marineford from amazon lily) Luffy sends the message 3D2Y to the crew

Day 77 (maybe) : (5 days return journey) Luffy starts training on Rusukaina.

2 years later…

Day 1 : Arrive at Saboady, reach fishman island, defeat Hody, party through the night.

Day 2 : Leave fishman island, arrive at Punk Hazard, defeat Caesar, leave Punk Hazard

Day 3 : Doffy’s resignation announced, crew arrives at dressrosa, defeats Doffy, half the crew head to zou.

Day 13 : (they say Jack left 10 days ago because of Doffy’s defeat) rest of the crew arrives at Zou, parties though the night

Day 14 : Kinemon reaches the top of the elephant, Robin deciphers the road poneglyph, Jack attacks Zou, Zunesha defeats Jack, half the crew leaves for Tottoland

Day 21 : (assuming it took 1 week to reach Tottoland) Luffy arrives at Cacao island

Day 22 : Luffy arrives at Whole Cake island, fights Cracker through the night

Day 23 : Sanji beats Luffy, Luffy fights the enraged Army, is captured, escapes, eats Sanji’s food

Day 24 : Luffy meets Bege, Tea party is ruined, Luffy fights Katakuri, the crew escapes Tottoland at night

Day 25 : Luffy is announced the fifth emperor, Revolutionaries save Lulusia kingdom

Day 27 : (2 days after Lulusia kingdom is saved) Reverie begins

Day 31 : (we get the news of the 4th day of reverie) Moria invades Blackbeard’s island, Act 2 begins, Luffy beats Dobon

Day 32 : Komurasaki dies

Day 33 : Komurasaki’s wake is cancelled

Day 34 : Komurasaki’s funeral, Yasuie dies, Big mom arrives in Udon, Udon is conquered by Luffy, Big mom and Kaido clash

Day 36 : Big mom and Kaido form an Alliance

Day 41 : (one week since Reverie ends) Raid on Onigashima begins on the day of the Fire festival

(Source: Reddit)

As you can see, this is a very precise timeline confirming that Luffy has been at sea for roughly two years and 134 days, or about two years and four months, based on the data collected. So, considering that fact, we know that Luffy is now roughly two years older than he was when his journey began. Knowing that Luffy was 19 years old at the time, we can deduce that he was 17 when he started his journey, and Oda actually confirmed that in SBS Volume 4, back in 1998, revealing the following:

D: How old are Luffy, Zoro, Nami, and Shanks?

O: A lot of people mailed me with questions regarding age. Really a lot of people. I guess this must be the No.1 question that everyone always thinks of. Well I will answer it now! Luffy is currently 17 years old, Zoro 19, Nami 18. Well, since we have no idea where Shanks is at this moment, I’ll just answer how old he was supposed to be 10 years ago. In Luffy’s village, he was 27 years old. As for Usopp, he’s 17 years old just like Luffy.

As you can see, Luffy was 17 when he started his journey, and this was confirmed by Oda himself. You can track the progression of his journey in the timeline we’ve provided above, and you’ll see that it all adds up.

The youngest we saw him was when he was seven years old, still a small child with a burning desire to become a pirate. Ten years later, that same child set sail, alone, hoping to gather a pirate crew and become the Pirate King by finding Gol D. Roger’s One Piece treasure. And the rest is history.