Tanjiro Kamado is the main protagonist in the hit anime series, Demon Slayer. But Tanjiro has become pretty unique for a shonen main character. Unlike Midoriya in My Hero Academia, or Naruto, or Luffy from One Piece who aim to be the best they can be in their field (hero, ninja, and pirate, respectively), Tanjiro's main goal for doing everything he does is to save his sister, Nezuco.
Tanjiro is an extremely humble character. He starts out being a simple boy who lives in the rural parts of Japan with his family. After the massacre and Nezuko's change, he spends years trying to learn the ways of fighting so that he may join the Demon Corp to figure out a way to save his sister. But Tanjiro is utterly kind and tries to help everyone he meets through his actions oftentimes rather than his blade.
10 Does Tanjiro Have A Love Interest? Yes, Kanao Tsuyuri
People who have only seen the one season of the anime may be unaware that Tanjiro has any kind of love interest. Most shonen anime make it clear from the get-go as to who likes who and which character the protagonist usually has their eyes on.
But Demon Slayer introduced Tanjiro's main love interest briefly, and she doesn't really return until the end of the season, when she is fighting against him. His love interest that develops as the story goes on is Kanao Tsuyuri and their romance is quite adorable.
9 How Old Is Tanjiro? He Is 15 At The Current Point In The Anime
Pretty much all of the characters in Demon Slayer look incredibly young, even the Hirashi which are meant to be older than Tanjiro and his friends. The art style makes the characters appear much younger than they are so many fans probably feel a bit confused as to how old they actually are.
Nezuko often looks like an actual child when she is in her small form, which makes sense considering she is 12 years old physically and 14 biologically. Tanjiro is her older brother and is currently 15 years old in the anime, but started the series at 13.
8 How Many Siblings Does He Have? He Had 5, Though Only Nezuko Remains Alive
At the beginning of the series, it is shown that Tanjiro has a number of siblings that he helps his mother take care of as he is the oldest brother to all of them. His siblings all love and look up to him and he tries to help them as much and as often as he can.
Tanjiro has a total of five siblings, which means there are six children in total. Himself, Nezuko, Takeo, Hanako, Shigeru, and Rokuta. Of course, all of his siblings besides Nezuko were killed by Muzan and make little appearances in dream-like sequences after.
7 Who Are His Parents? Tanjuro And Kie, With The Former Having Ties To The World Of Demon Slaying
Tanjiro's parents are Tanjuro and Kie. Fans see a lot of his mother, Kie, in those first couple of episodes when they also meet the rest of Tanjiro's siblings. Kie became a single mother after her husband, Tanjuro passes. Tanjuro appeared to be a wise but very sick and frail man in his later years and succumbed to an illness a bit before the massacre of the family, which is why Tanjiro helps his mother care for his siblings.
Tanjuro definitely had some kind of association with the demon-killing world, but never showed as such and continued to be an inspiration to his two living children.
6 How Long Did He Train? Two Years, Under Sakonji Urokodaki
Tanjiro isn't like most shonen characters who just magically came into a ton of power. While training arcs are super important in shonen anime, Tanjiro needed one from the get-go as he didn't even really know how to properly wield a sword.
Tanjiro trained for two long years, mastering his water breathing technique, under Sakonji Urokodaki. During that same time, Urokodaki had Nezuko under a spell to control her demon abilities. Tanjiro continues to train hard throughout the series to master new skills he learns along the way.
5 What Is His Connection To Yoriichi & Kokushibo Tsugikuni? He Doesn't Have One, And It's Only Teased As A Plot Misdirect
In season one of the anime, fans get to see hints that Tanjiro may have some deeper connection to two figures from his past that may also be currently involved with Muzan and the Twelve Moon Demons. We see that these two twin brothers share Tanjiro's Hanafuda earrings, scars and seem to look a lot like him, but the connection between them all is still unclear.
This is a spoiler, but the truth is that Tanjiro doesn't really have any connection to them. Their shared appearances are meant to act as a red herring as Tanjiro's ancestor was just close friends with Yoriichi, who he keeps seeing in his dreams (which are really memories passed down from Sumiyoshi).
4 How Many Breathing Styles Does He Know? Two: Water Breath And Sun Breath
It wouldn't be a shonen anime without main character syndrome. So, of course, Tanjiro ends up learning more than one breathing style, a pretty uncommon trait.
Tanjiro is training in the water breath at the beginning of the series but eventually discovers that he also has the ability to learn to harness the Sun Breath and the Hinokami Kagura, both of which were learned and passed down from his ancestors. The latter is a fighting style that is known as Dance of the Fire God.
3 Why Does He Have More Than One Breath? He Learned One On His Own, And The Other Was Passed Down Through His Family
As mentioned, the Kamado line actually learned the Sun Breath and passed it down to each generation. Sumiyoshi Kamado is the grandfather to Tanjiro and Nezuko. He was saved by Yoriichi Tsugikuni, a close friend who developed the Sun Breath on his own.
Yoriichi taught the Sun Breath and the Dance of the Fire God to Sumiyoshi, which he then passed down to his son, Tanjuro, along with Yoriichi's earrings. Tanjiro ends up learning of his family's connection to the Sun Breath and ends up learning it for himself.
2 Who Are His Closest Friends? Zenitsu Agatsuma And Inosuke Hashibira
Tanjiro quickly befriends two quirky boys who compete in the Demon Corps entrance exam alongside him, Zenitsu Agatsuma and Inosuke Hashibira. Zenitsu was trained in Thunder Breathing and only actually knows one style (in the anime, at least). But that one move always packs a huge punch. The thunder boy also starts the series of being terribly nervous and afraid of everything he encounters which leaves a ton of space for him to grow.
Inosuke is a master of Beast Breath and channels the boar whenever he is in combat. Inosuke is loud and obnoxious, always eager for a fight, but has a distractingly pretty face which is why he always wears his boar helmet.
1 Does He Have Any Natural Talent? He Has A Superhuman Sense Of Smell
Something that set Tanjiro on the right path before he even trained in sword fighting, and what impressed Giyu enough to help Tanjiro and Nezuko, was the young boy's sense of smell. Tanjiro was able to read through people's movements, actions, and even species based on how they smelled to him. He uses this to catch Giyu off guard in their first encounter with one another and still uses it in his own fighting after all his training.