List of Death Note chapters


This is a list of the chapters of the Japanese manga series Death Note, written by Tsugumi Ohba and illustrated by Takeshi Obata. The individual chapters were originally serialized in Shueisha's Weekly Shōnen Jump, from December 2003 to May 2006, with 108 chapters in all. The series primarily focuses on high school student Light Yagami who decides to use a supernatural notebook called the "Death Note", which kills anyone whose name is written in it, to rid the world of evil.
Death Note has been compiled into twelve tankōbon in Japan, with the first being released on April 2, 2004, and the twelfth on July 4, 2006. In addition to these, a guidebook for the manga, Death Note 13: How to Read, was also published on October 13, 2006. The guidebook has information about the series, with character profiles, creator interviews, and the pilot chapter that preceded Death Note. A one-shot story special of Death Note was also released in February 2008, and is set two years after the original story's epilogue; a second one-shot was announced to be in development in April 2019. Death Note has been adapted into an anime with thirty-seven episodes produced by Nippon Television, and has three live action films.
The Death Note manga is licensed by Viz Media for North American distribution under their "Shonen Jump Advanced" imprint. Viz published the first volume on October 10, 2005, and the last on July 3, 2007. A hardcover version of volume 1 was also released by Viz on September 16, 2008. Viz published Death Note 13: How to Read on February 19, 2008, and collected the Death Note volumes along with Death Note 13: How to Read into a box set on October 7, 2008. On October 4, 2016, all 12 original manga volumes and the February 2008 one-shot were released in a single All-in-One Edition, consisting of 2,400 pages in a single book. The All-in-One Edition was released in English on September 6, 2017, resulting in the February 2008 one-shot being released in English for the first time. A standalone Death Note: Special One Shot written by Ohba and drawn by Obata, was published in February 2020.

Volume list

Tsugumi Ohba stated that most of the chapter titles for Death Note were selected during the development of the thumbnails. He added that sometimes he created several choices and consulted his editor for the final selections. He and his editor often selected the final name of the following chapter while he made corrections to the one that he was currently working on. Ohba had selected the names of chapters 107 and 108 before the thumbnail stages of those chapters. After the selection of the name of Chapter 3, Ohba decided to have each chapter name consist of one Japanese word. Ohba said that around the time of the selection of the name of Chapter 4, he began to "have fun" with the chapter names and begin trying to avoid spoiling plot information through the selection of chapter names. Ohba intended for many of his titles, such as the title of Chapter 7, to have many meanings depending on how one approaches the name. Ohba says that he often discussed titles with his editor when Ohba was unable to create a title that he liked, but that this did not necessarily mean that they would find a better title.
Ohba decided to end the series at 108 chapters at the time he decided how Death Note would end, and he kept the 108 chapter limit in mind when he created thumbnails. When Kiyomi Takada was reintroduced to the plot, Ohba had already set the plot, chapter numbers, and the Yellow Box warehouse scene; therefore he encountered difficulty in having the series end in exactly 108 chapters.
Ten years after the events of Kira, Ryuk returns to the human world and approaches Minoru Tanaka, a middle-school student as intelligent as Light, and offers him the Death Note. Minoru inquires about Kira's use of the book, as well as the rules of the Death Note. As the world has adopted more intense surveillance to prevent another Kira incident, Minoru devises a scheme and willingly gives Ryuk the notebook back but asks him to return in two years before he loses his memories. Two years later, Ryuk returns and touches Minoru with the book, restoring his memories. Minoru reveals his plan is to auction off the power Kira had to the highest bidder, and uses Ryuk to have this broadcast over television. The bids over social media escalate quickly, while Near and the surviving SPK members, having had touched the Death Note previously, see Ryuk via camera footage but no way to trace him to the new "A-Kira". SPK try to catch Ryuk during another message but inadvertently appear on-screen, giving weight to the seriousness of the auction, and soon world leaders start bidding, including the presidents of China and the United States The US president offers a bid of a quadrillion yen, upon which Minoru decides to close the auction. Through Ryuk, Minoru instructs the U.S. to deposit the amount across all accounts of Japanese citizens under 60 years old with Yotsuba bank accounts, an amount that comes to roughly one billion yen per person. However, the activities on Earth over the Death Note have alerted the Shinigami King, who orders Ryuk to come once he leaves Minoru. After the U.S. follows through on payment, Minoru relinquishes the Death Note again for Ryuk to deliver and asks him never to see him again. Near realizes that A-Kira's activities have made it impossible to identify his identity outside of one to benefit from this economic boon, and abandons the case. When Ryuk arrives at the White House, Ryuk reveals there was a change in the Death Note rules by the King: that anyone attempting to sell or purchase the book would be killed upon completion of the sale. The President refuses to take ownership of the book, and instead will assert that he still has the power of Kira but chooses not to use it to improve his standing. To follow the new rule, Ryuk writes Minoru's name in the Death Note when he attempts to take out his share of the newfound wealth, killing him.