One Piece's Elbaf Arc: Where the Anime Actually Stands Right Now

Toei confirmed a 26-episode plan for the Elbaf arc across 2026, split into two 13-episode cours with a break in between rather than running the whole thing straight through — the same patient, no-rush pacing the studio has leaned on for other major arcs in recent years.

Cour 1 ran weekly from Episode 1156 (April 5, 2026) through Episode 1168 (June 28, 2026), with both Netflix and Crunchyroll simulcasting the Japanese-subtitled version starting day one. Cour 2's exact start date was left to be announced once Cour 1 wrapped.

Here's the catch that matters most for anyone specifically waiting on the English dub: when Cour 1 launched, only the subtitled version had a confirmed weekly release — the dubbed episodes didn't have a release date attached at all. That's consistent with how Toei has handled recent One Piece arcs in general; the dub tends to trail the sub by a real stretch rather than airing in step with it.

For anyone who's avoided spoilers until now: Elbaf is a giant-inhabited island arc that's been quietly set up since early East Blue-era foreshadowing, and it's long been considered by manga readers one of the most anticipated unadapted arcs left in the story — which is exactly why Toei is giving it a two-cour, unhurried treatment instead of compressing it to catch up to the manga faster.

Practical note if you're trying to time a watch around this: check your own region's Netflix or Crunchyroll listings directly for the current dub status rather than assuming — it's a detail that shifts cour to cour, and sometimes episode to episode. If you haven't worked through the earlier sagas yet, our full saga-by-saga ranking is the faster way to catch up before Elbaf gets there.