The Pokémon anime has been airing for almost 25 years, which is an unbelievable accomplishment. There are people finishing college in 2021 who weren't even born until after Ash had already lost the Indigo League and moved on to the Orange Islands. There's so much Pokémon content to consume that even the mightiest of binge-watchers might shudder at the thought of binging a show that will be old enough to rent a car next April. But the question remains: how long would it take to watch Pokémon from start to finish?
At the time of writing, the anime is in the midst of Season 24 and has aired a grand total of 1,164 episodes during its run. To put that in perspective, Ash was only 10 years old when the series began, and now he's… well, that part's not really clear. They don't make over 1,000 episodes for just any show, so Pokémon is doing something right that certainly makes it worth the watch. Anyone interested in a re-watch of this series had better start sooner than later because this money-printing franchise shows no signs of slowing down.
At roughly 22 minutes per episode, excluding any spin-offs, mini-series or films, there are about 426.8 hours of Pokémon to watch. Watching TV 24/7 is not practical or even really possible, so let's break down the time it would take for a re-watch, assuming the viewer works a nine-to-five job, gets adequate sleep, and maintains social relationships, but is still a diehard Pokémon fan. This way, we can determine the amount of time it would reasonably take to watch the entire series.
With a family, job, and healthy(ish) sleep schedule, a dedicated binger could probably bang out 12 episodes a day during the week. This would be roughly 4.4 hours per day, for a total of 60 episodes watched from Monday-Friday. On the weekends, the extra time could reasonably allow for 25 episodes each day, which would take roughly 9.2 hours per day for a total of 50 episodes watched over the weekend. Again, this person is a diehard Pokémon fan who will make the time.
Assuming a weekly total of 110 episodes at this pace, given that there are 1,164 episodes, it would take approximately 10.5 weeks to watch Pokémon in its entirety. This would be roughly two and a half months of watching Pokémon for about 40 hours a week. The viewer would live a lifetime with Ash by doing so, but only one of them would be older at the end of it. Fortunately, where there's a will, there's a way -- which is probably the name of an episode at some point, considering there are almost 1,200 episodes that all needed different titles.
Ash was pretty hard to watch during his Kanto days, so it's fortunate that the Indigo League is the second shortest arc of the series, with just 82 episodes. The Orange Islands hold the record for shortest arc, clocking in at 36. The longest arc is the Hoenn and Battle Frontier saga, which runs 191 episodes, just barely beating Sinnoh's 190-episode total. With so much content, the Pokémon anime is as endless as the wide world of Pokémon, and there's still plenty to discover for even the most passionate of fans.
