When Do Naruto and Hinata Get Together? The Full Timeline
They actually get together in The Last: Naruto the Movie, set roughly two years after the Fourth Great Ninja War.
That single fact resolves probably the biggest common complaint about the ending. A lot of readers go straight from the war arc to chapter 700 and find Naruto already married with two kids, and reasonably conclude the relationship came out of nowhere. It didn’t. The Last is canon, and it’s specifically where the relationship actually develops and resolves. If you skipped it, you skipped the actual story here.
The full timeline
Here is the whole thing in order, from the first hint to the epilogue.
| Point in the story | What happens |
|---|---|
| Childhood, before the main story | Hinata admires Naruto from a distance for years. This is established early and stays consistent, long before either of them is old enough for it to be framed as romantic. |
| The Chunin Exams | Naruto encourages her ahead of her fight with Neji. It is a small moment on his end and a formative one on hers. |
| Pain’s invasion of Konoha | Hinata steps directly in front of Pain to protect Naruto and confesses outright, in Shippuden episode 166, “Confession.” She is very nearly killed doing it. |
| The Fourth Great Ninja War | They fight alongside each other and his attitude visibly starts to shift, but neither of them acts on the confession during the fighting. |
| The Last, about two years after the war | Naruto finally works out how he feels. This is where they actually get together. |
| The wedding and chapter 700 | The wedding is covered near the end of Shippuden’s television run, and the manga’s epilogue shows them married, with Boruto and Himawari. |
The confession during Pain’s invasion is the scene most people are actually looking for when they search this. It is the moment her feelings stop being subtext and become an explicit, on-screen fact of the story, and it is the one worth rewatching.
The honest part
A fair criticism exists here, and it’s worth acknowledging directly rather than defending or dismissing it. Naruto’s side of the relationship is underdeveloped in the manga itself, largely because the actual turning point happens in a film rather than on the printed page. At the same time, Hinata’s side of this is one of the most consistently developed threads in the entire series, tracked carefully from very early on. Both of those things are true simultaneously, and neither cancels the other out.
Why it took Naruto so long
Here’s the more interesting question underneath the timeline. Naruto spent essentially the entire series chasing Sakura, and more importantly, spent it almost entirely focused on Sasuke and on earning acknowledgment from the village. He simply wasn’t emotionally available to notice Hinata for most of the story, and the series is fairly consistent about showing that, even while it also plays his obliviousness for comedy a lot of the time.
There’s a reasonable reading that Naruto’s arc was never really built around romance at all until very late, since almost every ounce of his emotional energy across the original series and Shippuden goes toward two things: proving himself to a village that ignored him as a child, and pulling Sasuke back from the choices that were destroying him. Hinata’s feelings existing quietly in the background for most of that time isn’t a contradiction of his character, it’s a direct consequence of what the story made him care about first.
Where the anime fills in what the manga left out
Anyone comparing notes across formats should know that the anime carries noticeably more of this relationship than the manga does.
Shippuden’s television run devotes a stretch of episodes near its end to the lead-up to the wedding itself, covering preparations, the reactions of the wider cast, and scenes between the two of them that have no manga equivalent. None of it changes the outcome, but it does considerable work smoothing the jump that manga-only readers experience as abrupt.
That is the practical answer to why two fans can disagree about whether this relationship felt earned. A reader who finished the manga and stopped has seen the confession and then the epilogue. A viewer who watched Shippuden through to the end and saw The Last has seen most of a full arc.
If the relationship felt sudden to you, the odds are good that you are missing material rather than remembering it wrong.
Worth adding that the film was released between the manga’s ending and the start of Boruto, which is part of why it slots so cleanly into the gap rather than feeling like a side story.
What The Last adds that the manga skipped
To be specific about what happens in the film itself, since “watch The Last” is easy advice to give without explaining why it matters. The film gives Naruto an actual, dedicated arc of noticing Hinata, working through jealousy when he thinks she might be interested in someone else, and consciously choosing to pursue the relationship rather than stumbling into it. That’s the exact piece the manga’s jump to chapter 700 skips entirely, and it’s the reason The Last exists as a film in the first place: to give Naruto’s half of this relationship the same kind of dedicated screen time Hinata’s had for years by that point in the story.
This relationship resolves inside the wider ending covered in the Shippuden ending explained, and it also sits at the top of the ranking of the best anime couples.
Common questions
What episode do Naruto and Hinata get together?
They actually get together in The Last: Naruto the Movie rather than in a numbered episode. That film is canon and is set roughly two years after the Fourth Great Ninja War, which is why the relationship can feel abrupt to anyone who skipped it.
What episode is Hinata’s confession?
Shippuden episode 166, titled ‘Confession’. She steps in front of Pain to protect Naruto, tells him how she feels, and is very nearly killed doing it.
Why did Naruto not notice Hinata sooner?
Because almost all of his emotional attention went elsewhere. He spent the series chasing Sakura, pursuing acknowledgment from a village that had ignored him, and above all trying to pull Sasuke back. The story is fairly consistent about showing that, even while playing his obliviousness for comedy.
Is The Last worth watching?
If you want this relationship to make sense, yes. It is the only place Naruto’s own side of it is properly developed, and skipping it is the single most common reason readers feel the epilogue came out of nowhere.
