 "Dragon Ball" is credited as one of the main reasons manga circulation was at its highest between the mid-1980s and mid-1990s.<ref name="IbarakiInterview"></ref><ref name="comipress-jump"></ref> During "Dragon Ball"s initial run in "Weekly Shōnen Jump", the manga magazine reached an average circulation of 6.53million weekly sales, the highest in its history.<ref name="TimeMag"></ref> During "Dragon Ball"s serialisation between 1984 and 1995, "Weekly Shōnen Jump" magazine had a total circulation of over 2.9billion copies.<ref name="exlight"></ref>

"Dragon Ball" also sold a record number of collected "tankōbon" volumes for its time.By 2000, more than 126million "tankōbon" copies had been sold in Japan alone.<ref name="LittleBoy"></ref> It sold over 150million copies in Japan by 2008, making it the best-selling manga ever at the time.<ref></ref> By 2012, its sales in Japan had grown to pass 156million, making it the second best-selling "Weekly Shōnen Jump" manga of all time, behind "One Piece".<ref name="156mil"></ref> "Dragon Ball"s "tankobon" volumes sold 159.5million copies in Japan by February 2014,<ref name="jump2014"></ref> and have sold over 160million copies in Japan as of 2016.<ref name="naver"></ref>

The manga is similarly popular overseas, having been translated and released in over 40countries worldwide.<ref></ref> Estimates for the total number of "tankōbon" volumes sold worldwide range from more than 250million copies<ref></ref><ref>
Images from the book stating 250 Million worldwide sales.See See 

For the 10th anniversary of the Japan Media Arts Festival in 2006, close to 79,000 Japanese fans voted "Dragon Ball" the third greatest manga of all time.<ref></ref> In a 2007 survey of one-thousand people conducted by Oricon, Goku ranked in first place as the "Strongest Manga Character of All Time".<ref></ref> Coinciding with the 2012 Summer Olympics, Oricon conducted a survey at the international World Cosplay Summit on which manga and anime series attendees considered world class works.