The story of Naruto is packed with colorful, richly realized anime characters, many of whom have impressively well-realized character arcs and emotional lives. One example is the hero Naruto himself, who is far more than just a troublemaker with everything to prove, and the same is also true of his first jonin mentor, Kakashi Hatake.

On the outside, Kakashi is eccentric, unpredictable and rather aloof, but this copycat ninja has a vibrant inner life, and he often shares his creative insights with his friends and allies in the story of Naruto. Therefore, Kakashi's personality can be assessed not just by his astrological sign but also by his MBTI personality type.

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Kakashi Hatake's MBTI Personality Type: INTP, The Logician

Kakashi Hatake lifting up his headband to show his sharingan eye in Naruto.

Kakashi Hatake is best described as the INTP, or the Logician, one of the rarer but more intriguing personality types. The Logician's code stands for Introverted Intuitive Thinking Perceiving, which describes someone who is cool and aloof on the outside but lively, creative and energetic on the inside. Logicians have rich inner lives thanks to their boundless curiosity, quest for new ideas and ability to analyze just about anything around them. In many ways, the INTP type is similar to its INTJ Architect cousin, except INTPs are more about innovation and creativity while INTJs are more about theories, planning ahead and creating strategies for pursuing projects. The INTP type also has overlap with the ISTP Virtuoso personality type, although INTPs are even more withdrawn and tend to analyze things more than hands-on Virtuosos do.

In short, the INTP Logician type tirelessly seeks fresh new ideas and ways to improve the world with them. Logicians are restless, never being satisfied with the way things are and instead brainstorming new methods, ideas or strategies to make anything and everything better. They are idea-oriented tinkerers and innovators, though they won't always get their own hands dirty with these exciting new ideas. Logicians are the brains of a project, while Virtuosos and ESTP Entrepreneurs are the ones who do the hard work with their Sensing nature and the ESTP's extroverted ways. An INTP Logician might think up new political theories and let an ESTJ Executive ally run for office, or the Logician might think up a new model of engine and let a Virtuoso actually build a prototype.

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The INTP type has some unique strengths that many others lack. With their NT core, Logicians are adept at finding, analyzing and using all manner of patterns and data, similar to their INTJ cousins. The difference is that while an INTJ might fixate on one grand project, an INTP will juggle a handful of exciting ideas, always seeking something new and innovative to try. This makes INTPs pretty flexible with their brainstorming, and they're not as narrow as stubborn INTJs tend to be. INTPs are also wonderfully original and unorthodox in their thinking, and they put serious emphasis on the truth as a matter of both principle and practicality.

Then again, INTPs may annoy or alienate people with their withdrawn nature and blunt honesty, which could sabotage their efforts as project leaders. INTPs, like their INTJ and ENTJ cousins, aren't so good at reading people, and that can cause friction. INTP Logicians might also sabotage themselves with their perfectionistic and restless ways, and they may actually overthink some things and wear their ideas down to a nub. At some point, they need to stop thinking and start doing.

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Kakashi Hatake as an INTP in Naruto

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Kakashi Hatake plays fast and loose with the rules of his Logician personality type, but that kind of creativity and innovation is all part of the INTP type's charm. To begin with, Kakashi is all about personal rules and codes, and he won't bend those rules without good reason. Logicians like him need solid evidence and a well-thought-out argument to accept new ideas from others, and in Kakashi's case, he finally changed his rigid rules after he witnessed Obito Uchiha's "death." Obito had valued teamwork and friendship over strict adherence to the rules, and Kakashi, who didn't truly have a heart of stone, took note of that. Inspired by Obito's apparent demise and Rin's noble sacrifice, Kakashi internalized those new rules and made them his own. Now he's as strict about the "friendship first" rule as he was about the original rules, and no one can convince him otherwise. Logicians are all about patterns, analysis and logic, and Kakashi embodies that throughout his life.

During the main events of Naruto, Kakashi acted as a true INTP by being cool, detached and bluntly honest on the outside, all while his mind buzzed with exciting new ideas and theories for innovative jutsu. He never mastered Minato Namikaze's Rasengan jutsu, but he did develop a counterpart, the deadly Lightning Blade/Chidori. Kakashi is always thinking about not just jutsu creation but also battlefield tactics and strategies, observing battlefield conditions with his Perceiving nature to think up brilliant new ideas, just like Shikamaru. Every ninja battle in Naruto is a web of clashing patterns, ideas and data, and only an INTP like Kakashi could get such a firm grasp on those ideas to find victory. That's similar to how he can perceive other jutsu with his Sharingan eye and incorporate it thoughtfully into his own fighting style as a resourceful, creative Logician.