The fight between Goku and Freeza was one of the most memorable in the franchise, and one of the longest too, but did it really last 5 minutes?

In this fight, Goku transforms into a Super Saiyan for the first time and Frieza slowly realizes that he won’t be able to stop him. 

Therefore, in a moment of fury, the Emperor of the Universe throws an energy sphere at the center of Namek and claims that the planet would explode in just 5 minutes , but of course that time is not accurate.

When we talk about the overall duration of the fight between Goku and Frieza, we have somewhere around three and a half hours . 

The fight started in episode 87 and ended in 106, totaling 19 episodes.

However, you’ll be surprised how long this has lasted in the world of Dragon Ball. According to Daizenshuu 7 , the Frieza Saga took place in December of the year 762 ; more than a month and a half after Vegeta and Nappa invaded Earth, which happened on November 3 of the same year.

The battle against Freeza took place on December 24, 762, on Christmas Eve. It is also the same day that Piccolo is resurrected and sent to Namek, where he fights alongside Vegeta, Krillin and Gohan against the Emperor of Evil, while Goku recovers in the spaceship.

After leaving the ship, Goku goes to meet Frieza and begins to face him. Later, Frieza assassinates Krillin, turning Goku into a Super Saiyan for the first time and giving us that fighting spectacle.

Everything indicates that Frieza’s 5 minutes was not in a literal sense, but just a way of demonstrating that the planet would explode very soon, whether in 10, 15, 30 minutes. 

Some fans argue that Freeza was accurate in his 5 minutes, as the fight would happen at much faster speed, but there is a lot of dialogue, so this seems unlikely, even for the manga, which has no filler.