The story follows five mystical warriors called the Saints who fight wearing sacred sets of armor named "Cloths", the designs of which derive from the various constellations the characters have adopted as their destined guardian symbols.

The tournament is interrupted by the vengeful Phoenix Bronze Saint, Ikki, who wishes to eliminate the people who forced him to undergo his especially harsh training.

He steals parts from the Sagittarius Cloth and eventually fights against the remaining Bronze Saints: Seiya, Shun (Ikki's brother), Shiryū, and Hyōga.

Following several battles, Seiya gets to the Pope's temple and learns that he is actually the Gold Saint Gemini Saga, who suffers from a split personality: one good and one evil.

In the second story arc, the Greek god Poseidon reincarnates within the body of Julian Solo, the heir to a rich and powerful family, and plots to flood the Earth.

As Seiya, Hyōga, and Shiryū make their way to Julian, Ikki learns that the mastermind behind this conflict is Saga's twin brother, Gemini Kanon, who is manipulating Poseidon.

The third and last arc follows how Hades, the Underworld god, is freed from his seal and revives the deceased Gold Saints and the Pope Aries Shion, and alongside some of his 108 Specters, sends them to the Sanctuary to kill Athena.

[7] Since he thought simple sports like judo or karate would not be interesting enough, he added aspects from Greek mythology and constellations to make it innovative.

[8] Although they look like European medieval armors, Kurumada said his main inspiration for the Cloths was Hajime Sorayama's 1983 illustration book Sexy Robot.

[7] Initially, he could not decide what type of armor it would be, considering even Buddhist kasaya; based on the Greek motif, he designed the actual Saint Cloths.

A prologue chapter was published in Akita Shoten's Weekly Shōnen Champion on April 27, 2006,[28] and the series officially debuted in the magazine on August 23 of the same year.

[31][32] Kurumada published in Akita Shoten's Champion Red a series of special in-depth chapters of events from the manga; Saint Seiya: Episode Zero, from December 19, 2017,[33] to February 19, 2018.

[23] A spin-off series by Megumu Okada, titled Saint Seiya Episode.G, was serialized in Akita Shoten's Champion Red from December 19, 2002,[37] to June 19, 2013.

[38] A second spin-off series by Shiori Teshirogi, titled Saint Seiya: The Lost Canvas, was serialized in Weekly Shōnen Champion from August 24, 2006,[39] to April 7, 2011.

[40] A third spin-off series by Chimaki Kuori Saint Seiya: Saintia Shō, was serialized in Champion Red from August 19, 2013,[41] to July 19, 2021.

[47] A sixth spin-off series by Seira Shimotsuki, titled Saint Mariya (聖闘士真理矢), started in Akita Shoten's shōjo manga magazine Princess on January 6, 2025.

[48] Three Saint Seiya Anime Special mooks, published by Shueisha under its Jump Gold Selection imprint, were released from July 13, 1988, to April 19, 1989.

[54] Saint Seiya 30 Shūnen Kinen Gashū Seiiki – Sanctuary (聖闘士星矢 30周年記念画集 聖域 ―SANCTUARY―), an art book which contains over 90 illustrations by Masami Kurumada, was launched by Takarajimasha on October 21, 2016.

[56] Since an episode adapts several chapters the anime goes faster than the manga, which led the TV series staff to create some original stories to fill the gap.

[84] New Video released the first seventy-three episodes on a subtitle-only DVD set, titled Saint Seiya: Sanctuary Classic Complete Collection, on April 15, 2014.

[91] A spin-off television series, Saint Seiya Omega, was broadcast for ninety-seven episodes on TV Asahi from April 1, 2012,[92] to March 30, 2014.

The first part, Sanctuary (十二宮編, Jūnikyū-hen, "Zodiac Chapter"), was directed by Shigeyasu Yamauchi, still with designs by Shingo Araki and Michi Himeno, while the scripts were done by Michiko Yokote, and the soundtrack was entirely taken from Yokoyama's work on the previous TV series.

[119] In 2003, the French magazine AnimeLand published an interview with Masami Kurumada where the author revealed that a company in Hollywood had approached him some years prior with a fifteen-minute pilot of a live-action film of Saint Seiya.

It stars Mackenyu as Seiya, Madison Iseman as Sienna, Sean Bean as Alman Kido, Diego Tinoco as Nero, Famke Janssen as Vander Guraad, Nick Stahl as Cassios and Mark Dacascos as Mylock.

A stage play adaptation of the first Saint Seiya film, Evil Goddess Eris, ran at Shibuya's Space Zero [ja] theater from July 28–31, 2011.

A selection is listed below: In the early 1990s, Renaissance-Atlantic Entertainment planned to produce an American animated version of the series titled Guardians of the Cosmos.

Only a pilot was made, and the intro was revealed at the end of YouTuber Ray Mona's documentary on the subject titled The Secret Stories of Saint Seiya in December 2022.

They also praised the grand soundtrack and director Shigeyasu Yamauchi's ability to stretch out the tension and chose the perfect places to stop an episode to keep audiences waiting for the next one.

Clements and McCarthy did, however, find the series disturbing in that its main emotional impact comes from the audience seeing "older boys and men fighting brave but naive teenagers" and through victories earning more weapons.

[156] Tite Kubo, the author of the manga series Bleach, named Saint Seiya as one of his biggest inspirations for the designs of the different types of weapons that his characters use in the story as well as the battle scenes.