Dragon Ball: Kaioken, Explained

When Goku learned of his Saiyan heritage in the earliest part of Dragon Ball Z, it presented a raising of stakes that the original Dragon Ball saw with the emergence of Demon King Piccolo. Goku, one of the most powerful fighters in the narrative by the end of Dragon Ball, was badly outmatched in the fight against his older brother Raditz and sacrificed his own life to beat him.

After traversing the Snake Way in the afterlife, Goku was able to receive training from King Kai, who taught him one of the most important moves in Goku’s arsenal: the Kaioken. What exactly is it, and what makes it such a significant point in Goku’s training over the course of the franchise?

What is Kaioken?

Power Amplification Invented by King Kai Himself

The Kaioken, also Romanized as “Kaio-ken”, “Kaioh-ken” and “Kaiōken”, is a technique invented by King Kai (the Kaiō) which augments the user’s physical abilities by several multiples at the cost of immense strain to the body. When activated, the user’s skin and clothes all glow with a fiery purple-red aura that can also cause their blood vessels to dilate and cause muscles to swell, instantly increasing their power level, strength, speed and awareness in battle for the technique’s duration. At its base level, the Kaioken doubles the user’s base power level, but its true value lies in its ability to stack its effect multiple times. During the battle against Vegeta in the Saiyan Saga, Goku managed to pull off Kaioken x4, but this increased output had extremely adverse side effects due to the strain the technique puts on the body.

After training under 100 times normal gravity, Goku learns to handle increased outputs, reaching heights like Kaioken x20 against the Ginyu Force during the Frieza Saga, but its limits are related to the user’s durability and combat experience. The mechanic that enables one to master and make use of the Kaioken is mastery over Ki control, which is part of the reason why it is hardly ever used in conjunction with the far more powerful Super Saiyan transformations (the first of which is at some point compared to the user’s base power multiplied 50 times) because these transformations are initially connected to heightened emotional states which affect Ki control and thus make the technique even more dangerous to apply alongside a transformation.

However, given that Goku overcomes these with mastery over each form, it should be possible to combine Kaioken with a Super Saiyan transformation as seen in Dragon Ball Super, when Goku combined the technique with Super Saiyan God Super Saiyan multiple times with immense drawbacks before perfecting it in the battle against Jiren during the Tournament of Power.

Its Biggest Advantage is Its Biggest Drawback

A Technique Created For Giant-Killing

The Kaioken’s ability to multiply the user’s base power several times makes it the perfect technique to employ when faced with an opponent far stronger than one’s self, and without the technique in his arsenal, Goku would likely have been crushed by Vegeta in their first battle. However, the technique follows the commonly seen idea that the stronger a technique, the greater the repercussions of using it, and so its biggest disadvantage is how much strain it causes the body for long periods after it is used. After using Kaioken x4 in the Galick Gun/Kamehameha beam struggle, Goku’s body was so worn out that a pat on the back from Yajirobe caused him to yowl in pain.

The strain is caused by the immense concentration it takes to keep the Kaioken activated, and the fact that it basically forces the body to operate with a flow of ki increased to several times its normal maximum output. It is therefore, awful for use in fights that are drawn out, and even when used by Goku in Dragon Ball Super, he can’t avoid the negative effects of the technique despite using it in tandem with Super Saiyan Blue, a form that came with minimal ki leakage, a problem of the non-divine Super Saiyan transformations.

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Dragon Ball Z

Dragon Ball Z is a Japanese anime series produced by Toei Animation and a sequel to the 1986 Dragon Ball series. It continues the adventures of Son Goku as an adult while also paralleling the life of his son Gohan. Son Goku typically defends the Earth from villains like Vegeta, Frieza, Cell, and Majin Buu. The series is followed by Dragon Ball GT and then Dragon Ball Super. 

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