One Piece: Can Luffy Use Gear 5 at Will? Activation Explained!

Luffy’s Gear 5 has been one of those moments One Piece fans had been waiting for for ages, and with the anime adaptation of the Wano Country Arc slowly arriving at its conclusion, fans of the anime series have finally been able to see Luffy’s Gear 5 in action in the anime as well. But now that that’s finally happened, we have even more questions, and one of them is – can Luffy now activate Gear 5 at will, or do certain conditions have to be met? Keep reading to find out!

As far as it is known, Luffy can activate Gear 5 at will, and there are no special conditions that have to be met now that he has finally awakened the true power of his Devil Fruit. The best piece of evidence we have is Luffy’s fight against Rob Lucci in the Final Saga, where both of them activated and used their awakened forms in battle. This proved that Luffy can now use Gear 5 like he uses all his other Gears, but since his Devil Fruit is actually Zoan now, there is a risk of Luffy succumbing to the prima instincts of his Devil Fruit, which is why he has to be careful with it.

The rest of this article will focus on Luffy’s Gear 5, his newest set of skills and abilities recently introduced in the manga. But, we’re not going to focus on the general aspect solely, as what interests us most is whether Luffy can now use Gear 5 without any restrictions. Of course, this article will focus on the events seen in the most recent episode of the anime and in the most recent manga chapters, which also means that this article will contain some spoilers, so be careful how you approach it.

The manga has confirmed that Luffy can use Gear 5 whenever he wants, but not without danger

So, before we actually answer the question, allow us to go over the original activation of Gear 5 and the dangers it poses, which is relevant to understanding why our question was even posed in the first place. Namely, you wouldn’t usually ask that with Luffy’s earlier Gears, but Gear 5 is specific in so many ways that we simply had to ask this question, and that is why an introduction to this issue is absolutely necessary.

The setting is, of course, Wano Country, and we are talking about Luffy’s fight against Kaido. The last one. And we must be honest and confirm that it was a very difficult fight for both of them, as they truly gave it their all this time. Punches were landing here and there, and while Big Mom was defeated, Kaidou seemingly managed to come out victorious, as he gained the upper hand at one moment and seemingly defeated Luffy for good.

This was a truly shocking moment, but since this was the arc’s peak, fans knew it wouldn’t end like that. It was too easy. So, what happened?

After appearing to be defeated, Luffy unexpectedly experienced a burst of new strength, making him so powerful that Kaido was powerless to stop him. This was Luffy simultaneously activating both his Gear 5 and the true nature of his Gomu Gomu no Mi, which was actually the mythical Zoan-type fruit Hito Hito no Mi, Model: Nika. After this happened, all of Kaidou’s assaults were ineffective on Luffy because his body was essentially made of rubber.

To counteract Kaidou’s weapons and attacks, Luffy was able to change his shape, rendering them entirely ineffective. One of the more absurd exhibitions of his ability in this encounter involved using Kaidou’s dragon form as a jump rope. He altered his stature, so Kaidou appeared to be a dwarf. In the end, Luffy used his newly discovered strength to defeat Kaidou, leaving the fate of the terrifying Emperor uncertain as he and Big Mom were both dropped into the depths of Wano Country.

As you can see, the power boost Luffy received from Gear 5 was absolutely ridiculous, and with his awakened form, he finally defeated one of his biggest rivals in the series. Of course, Gear 5 drained a lot of energy out of Luffy as well, and it will be some time before he can actually master it, but the little we saw at this moment actually indicated what we could actually expect from Gear 5 in the future and how it is going to be one of Luffy’s best weapons.

And luckily for us, we did not have to wait too long for that, as the Egghead Arc finally provided us with some additional information that showed us just how Gear 5 could should function in the future.

So, what happened? Well, the Egghead Arc is a direct continuation of the story that happened in Wano Country and the first arc of Oda’s Final Saga. And while we’re going to skip a lot of unnecessary details, we are just going to say to you what Luffy met, once again, with an old enemy – Rob Lucci. Rob Lucci was, interestingly enough, forbidden to attack Luffy at that point without permission as Luffy was an emperor now, but that did not stop him, so he showed off his new power – his awakened Devil Fruit – to Luffy. In response, Luffy immediately activated Gear 5, and the two continued to fight. Why is this important?

We won’t actually be spoiling the whole fight for you now, but this moment was important because it actually answers our main question – yes, Luffy is now able to activate his Gear 5 whenever he wants, which actually makes sense, seeing how his other Gears functioned as well.

Fans were worried that there might be some restrictions seeing how it drained a lot of energy and was declared as Luffy’s peak ability, but the fight against Rob Lucci finally confirmed everything that happened in Wano was not a coincidence, but actually Luffy’s new power. He is now able to use it freely and without any restrictions, although certain specific conditions had to be met for these power-ups to be activated. Luffy still hasn’t mastered Gear 5, that much is certain, but he has enough skills to control it properly and actually use it in battle.

Still, knowing how Zoan fruits are quite dangerous and how overuse could lead to a lot of trouble for Luffy, it will be interesting to observe just how his usage of Gear 5 will play out. Namely, overusing Zoan fruits can lead to the user succumbing to their basic instincts, which also means that Luffy could permanently transform into a new character, which wouldn’t be the best of solutions if you ask us. So yes, he can use it freely, but he will still have to be careful when using his Gear 5 abilities.