15:20 I did mention in the prequel video to this, both because its no fun just saying the Doctor is 4.5 billion, as well as his body and his surroundings resetting, we're gunna assume his body and age kept resetting to what it was when he arrived. Plus, you'd think he'd physically have aged even a tiny bit over that. So if his body doesn't age, I'm gunna with the idea that his number doesn't either.

imagine having 12 lives, then you lose your 3rd and 2nd to last lives really quickly so you desperately hold onto (what you think will be) your last life... actually makes sense why 11 lived so long

My favorite theory to explain why the War Doctor is about 800 when he regenerates, but Nine tells Rose he's about 900, is that Nine spent a hundred years travelling alone in between when Rose first refused him and when he returned to entice her into the TARDIS with "Oh, did I mention, it also travels in time?" I like the idea that he tried to go it alone but he couldn't stop thinking about Rose and eventually decided to go back to just seconds after he left to try to convince her.

I feel like Ten has lived the shortest, making his dissatisfaction about his sacrifice and death even more significant

People talk about how vain 10 is when he sends his regeneration energy into his severed hand so he doesn’t have to change, but this really explains why he felt that way. Especially with the “I don’t want to go, totally makes sense! Give the guy a break, he was only 5!

Now you can see why 10 said he could have done “SO MUCH MORE” in The End of Time.

I think the 9th doctor lived longer than a year. Russell T Davies has said since Rose that the mirror scene was not to show that he has recently regenerated. Also Clive shows Rose tonnes of pictures of the 9th Doctor on adventures to the Titanic etc. So I think that the 9th Doctor lived at least a few decades.

If u think about it, 11 being the longest kinda makes sense. It was (or at least he thought it was...) his last regeneration so was probably more careful. That’s not say that the other Doctors were reckless or the 11th Doctor wasn’t at all. But him having his youngest ever face seems like a chance to live longer so living the longest regeneration just makes sense to me, especially as he thought it was his last

Tbh the Doctor is that old he’s probably forgot his age lol

What about when Capaldi survives for 4.5 billion years or so in the Confession Dial? He remembers it during Hell Bent

If the War Doctor was being accurate when he said he was ‘400’ years younger than 11th Doctor then, because we saw him start to regenerate at the end of that story, so 9th Doctor must have lived about 100 years before we meet him. Granted that’s not what we’re led to believe in Rose but maybe he has some kind of amnesia.

gotta respect the hustle with the 11th doctor lol he's like, this is my last body, no way i'm just letting this shit go without using it up to it's breaking point

If the war doctor ‘reset’ his age, Eccleston, tennant and smith would forget due to repressing the war Doctor, and simply go off their age of their last recollective incarnation which was 8

If I remember correctly, the 9th Doctor was 800 during the episode Rose but at the end when he comes back for Rose after 100 years making him 100 years. The War doctor was 800 when he regenerated.

Didn't the 9th doctor have a lot of adventures in between the few seconds when he left rose then (seemingly) immediately come back telling her that the tardis also travels through time?

"no significant time jumps for the 12th doctor" hold up, where did the 4 and a half Billion years go, the time that he spent in the confession dial in 'heaven sent'

Well... Remember, the first rule: "The Doctor lies."

I hate that RTD made the Doctor so linear, its madness that 9 and 10s lives were so short. Eleven is my favourite so I'm glad he had such a long life

Can we just forget that the Timless Child happened?

We just gonna forget about the fact that 12 was in the confession dial for like 4 billion years?

I always believed that the Doctor wasn’t aware of his live as a agent in his 2nd body. Believing he’s younger than he actually is

Me when I first started watching Who: “aw 10, I get it but it’s okay, just regenerate” Me halfway thru 11’s run when I realized 10 literally a had so little time compared to the other incarnations: 🥺

The thing is, he's a time traveler. During the 3rd Doctor, for example, once he got full control of the Tardis he could have told Sarah Jane "I'm just going to pop out for something," then been gone 500 years, then popped back into her time two minutes later. 4th Dr could have gone all kinds of places after "The Deadly Assassin" when he had no companions. He could have done the same with Romana, since she was a fellow time lord. There's all kinds of "between companions" moments that can't be known.

Plug all the ages into a calculator, find the average age of the eighth and war doctors, and the doctor is round about 3809. Not as old as i was expecting him to be.

Biggest issues with some of these is the companions, especially in nuWho. The Doctor’s lack of control (and the randomiser installed after The Key Of Time) meant that he didn’t leave companions at home and come back to get them. This means that the 2nd Doctor’s life (ignoring 6b) is almost all spent alongside Jamie, so unless Ben & Polly were with him for many years between Power of The Daleks and The Highlanders in stories we didn’t see, that period of his life was extremely short. Similarly, the 3rd Doctor. As you say, his exile severely compressed his first few years up to The Three Doctors (although not necessarily ‘real time’, and the change from Liz to Jo could have happened after a number of years - we don’t see her age on departure). After this, though, the only point he can really have an extended life off-screen is between Jo & Sarah Jane, when he’s able to be away from Earth and come back shortly after he left. The 5th Doctor has a similar issue to the 2nd…except for a brief break between Timeflight and Arc of Infinity, Tegan was with him for almost the whole of his run. Only the times when alien companions Nyssa and Turlough travel with him solo could allow for longer periods offscreen, as they may age significantly slower than humans Six has the advantage of the undisclosed period prior to the trial, between Peri and Mel 7, 8 and the War Doctor, as mentioned, all have curtailed runs on screen and could have travelled alone or with multiple unseen companions Nine is certainly the shortest, but the feeling is there’s a lot more happening between episodes - how quickly Jack integrates, for example. Personally, I often feel like the Doctor doesn’t even remember his actual age, so often ball-parks it…I seem to remember Tom Baker gave multiple figures and hints on-screen which didn’t match up

The Eighth Doctor could be the oldest incarnation as he lived for around 1125 years in _Escape Velocity._

It makes sense not to count the confesion dial in 12th Doctor´s lifespan, after all it was a new doctor every day, but the guarding of the vault should add at least 900 years to his lifespan, as we hear he make an oath to guard it for a thousand years and I think he mentions at some point that the guarding is near its end.

I'm pretty sure the 12th Doctor spent 139 years in a stasis pod in 'Before the Flood'.

The doctor is like the ladies who claim they are only 21 years old, but are really closer to 50.

i can't remember the episode but i believe 3rd doctor blurts out he's been alive for "several thousand years" once...

The 12th Doctor spent over 70 years at the University where he met Bill. I would say he’s much older than said here.

Makes sense that 11 lived so long because he thought that was the end of him, no regenerations left, until some time lord magic came through to help him out

I think the 3rd Doctor actually lived longer than the 2nd Doctor did. Because with the 2nd Doctor, he was never without a companion. Having Jamie along, the 2nd Doctor may only have lived for a few years and aged in real-time with Jamie. However, the 3rd Doctor has a gap between 'The Green Death' and 'The Time Warrior' after Jo Grant leaves and Sarah Jane Smith joins. He has his TARDIS back, he's no longer Earthbound and he could have travelled for centuries between Season 10 and Season 11. The 2nd Doctor has no such gap.

Season 6B is the only thing that makes sense to explain the 300 year gap between the start of 2 and the start of 4 b/c we can declare concretely from the companions that the televised stories of the 2nd and 3rd Doctors each took up less than a single human lifespan. The 3rd Doctor in particular I think must have had the shortest lifespan of any Doctor, being mostly relegated to Earth and working with the same group of humans the whole time who clearly remain within a very limited span of their lives during his time with them and absolutely no indication that he and Jo or Sarah Jane would spend years in the TARDIS between Earth-bound adventures. And for the 2nd Doctor there's the fact that Jamie was with him for the entirety of his televised run so at most the 2nd Doctor's televised stories took place over 2 or 3 decades. This leaves only season 6B to fill the gap. There's nothing else. Or we just accept that the Doctor has no clue as to his actual age and be done with it. And I think the 10th Doctor lived a lot longer than you're crediting him. I think it's fairly heavily implied that he and Rose had years worth of travels that we just don't get to see. I think the same could be said of the Doctor and Donna, and I see no reason to think that his companion-less periods between seasons and the specials after season 4 were short periods. He could have traveled by himself for years - even decades - more during those spans.

Technically the 12th Doctor's consciousness ages 4.6 billion years in the confession dial, whilst his body didn't age more than a few hours, he did live through all that time

There's also an 8th doctor audio adventure where he was stranded on a planet of jellyfish people where he lived for about 800 years

The war doctor was 800 when he regenerated so the 9th was 101 when he did. How did you get him as only 1?

It says in a book that supposedly the 8th Doctor lost track of his age so started again from his regeneration. It explains the new who ages nicely for me.

Respectfully, I disagree with the idea that 9 only lived a year. In Rose, we see him all throughout history traveling alone and audio dramas without rose as well. I assume he spent about a year with rose with a few years alone before this

Its ironic that two of his longest lives (war and 8) are imediately followed by his shortest (9, 10) before being followed by his longest by far.

I’m actually not too surprised that Tennant’s span was so short, he didn’t have many points where he travelled alone, so if he had a crazy lifespan his companions would’ve been pretty old

Personally, I really like the idea that the Russell era doctors were fleeting lives in the grand scheme of the Doctors' life. That whole era was mostly about healing from the trauma of the time war so it make sense these doctors would live very fast.

The theory I always went by as to why his 9th and 10th incarnation seemed to be younger than his 6th and 7th was just he wasn't always going by Earth years, probably using Gallifreyan years in the classic series, but your theory on him resetting his age as the War Doctor because he didn't consider himself part of the lineage also works really well

To me, I think that the 10th doctor had a much longer lifespan, since he was alone for so long, in between every series he was without a companion, so it stands to reason that he could have had a long period of time between each series.

My head canon is that by the time of new Who, the Doctor bases his age from when he 'stole' the TARDIS since Eccleston's Doctor alternates between saying things along the lines of "900 years old" and "900 years of time travel"

OK, the 12th Doctor spent 24 years with River. He then spent 70 years teaching at the University. And then the question of how long he was in the confession dial. My question is, how long did he travel with Clara? In other words, from "Deep Breath" to "Face the Raven". I hope they had a few years together.

Btw I loved the video! I wasn’t criticising, I was just curious if those years counted

Theory: maybe a year on Gallifrey is much quicker than an Earth year, hence the big gaps 😂 Great vid :)

this actually explains how the war doctor and 11 died from "old age" really, because they lived to that old age in that body. "we're wearing a bit thin" "hope the ears are a bit less inconspicuous this time" hehe however, this age thing is thrown out of the window if you try and estimate the very total age with the previous incarnations before the doctor chose the name the doctor and fled Galifrey. Imagine adding all 3 together, the days before the doctor was the doctor, the days the doctor was the doctor, the days the doctor stopped being the doctor and then the days when the doctor became the doctor again. Imagine reading all that above as a non whovian too X'D

No wonder 11 said he'd never forget when the Doctor was him: He had the longest life. (Maybe?)

I imagine Eight having been one of the longest lived! He states hes >1000 in several books. Theres also points where he's stranded or imprisoned for ages at a time.

Even if we go with the War Doctor starting from scratch, nine must've been 100. Given that the War Doctor was 800 (math, he's 400 years younger than Smith when he's 1200), he says he's 900, ergo, Eccleston is 100.

I actually did a video on this, but from what I could find, the 9th Doctor lived less than a century, 10th Doctor lived the least amount of time at 6 years and the 11th Doctor lived the most at 1,200 years.

There’s a Eighth Doctor novel called _Vampire Science,_ in which he said that he’s 1012 and last regenerated three years ago (in his timeline), saying that he was 1009 when he was shot in San Francisco. What you failed to mention is that he began to count his age from his most regeneration, now declaring himself as 3 years old. That solves the problem between Classic and NuWho age of the Doctor lining up more accurately.

Not only did ten live very short but in his short time he burned up a regeneration. Like 2 regenerations and you lived that short? That's tough.

The 9th doctor lived for 101 years because the war doctor regenerates not long after he says to 11 he was 800 years old. This means that the 9th doctor lived 100 years of his life somewhere other than normal Earth time presumably the few seconds he leaves Rose before coming back and saying it is a time machine. So the 9th doctor was 800 when he met Rose in ROSE.

Update: 14 goes 4-6 hours before regenerating

Id say the 13th Doctor has lived for a few months.

Peter Capaldi's doctor regardless of the number, lived the longest because he spent billions of years in the confession dial.

“I’ll always remember when the doctor was me.” I feel like it’s hard not to considering how long he lasted.

Now we can probably add the 14th Doctor having lived around 3 days

I reckon Series 1 takes place over 1 year, with another year to include spin-off material and 10 years prior to Rose, at least. Maybe even 50, assuming the War Doctor was rounding when he said he was 800 on the last day of his incarnation.

Something I rarely see mentioned about this topic is something really fundamental- what is a year? A year means something to us, as humans, because it's the time it takes for the Earth to revolve around the sun. What does the Doctor count as a year? Maybe Gallifreyan years are shorter than Earth years, and after Gallifrey is destroyed in the time war, he chooses to make Earth his new home, and his age is modified to count in Earth years instead.

You’re missing all those billions of years that Peter Capaldi went through in order to get to Gallifrey. The famous quote he went the long way around. So he technically should be the longest living.

Did the 9th Doctor claim to be 900 years old before or after his time jump in between leaving Rose and picking her up at the end of the first episode? Because, if I remember correctly, that tiny gap includes entire adventures with multiple companions before he went back to grab Rose. Those adventures probably ended up adding several years to his life. Unfortunately, the same can't truly be said for the 10th. But who knows how long he was traveling after leaving Donna behind.

Look we all know the first doctor and all the doctors are still alive living in their own time streams...

The doctor has said in the past that all his past incarnations live in his head to an extent, so I can imagine them all being seriously pissed at 10 for burning through two bodies in 5 years.

The ninth as war was about 800 years in day of the doctor and regenerated in that episode I say it about 100 years.

I really found this ranking fascinating! I can't believe the disparity between the longest and shortest-lived Doctors! The fourth-longest-lived doctor in your ranking lived longer than the bottom eight doctors put together. The third-longest-lived doctor in your ranking lived longer than the bottom nine doctors put together and the longest-lived doctor in your ranking lived longer than the bottom ten doctors put together. 😂

I am so happy that my favourite Doctor is the longest-running.

Completely disagree about 9 only living one year. Big finish and pictures of him having solo adventures like being on the titanic on the show itself, combined with the fact that his entire screen tenor was spent with Rose means he had to have spent time between the war Doctor and meeting Rose or between leaving Rose and coming back and convincing her. Or both! 50 years travelling on his own refusing to look in a mirror due to how much he hates himself. Then he finally decides to get a companion and look in a mirror. Rose refuses, so he spends another 50 years travelling alone. All the while not being able to get Rose out his head, so he decides to go back one more time to try and convince her.

About 9 I disagree with 1 year assesment we saw different photographs of him in different eras before he offered Rose to travel with him and then returned saying "it can travel through time as well." In my opinion he met Rose first then once Rose rejected him his TARDIS disappeared and he went on solo advantures Rose saw eirlier and THEN returned to the same spot and told her: "It can travel through time too." So he lived far more than a single year, but I doubt it was a lot.

The 12th Doctor went into hiding in a stasis chamber for about 140 years. Why does everyone keep forgetting about that?!

Easy. 14th was the shortest being only for 15 hours or so. 11th is the longest, staying on trenzalore. Arguement could be made for 12 in the confession dial but i dont think that counts

Turns out the damn translator circuit forgot to convert Gallifreyan years to Earth years

This proves it, we didn’t get nearly enough of the 9th doctor

I'd highly recommend going through the Doctor's Age page on the Doctor Who wiki as it goes through all forms of media and gives very detailed accounts of each Doctor's age and how they count their age.

I love how they made someone like the Eleventh Doctor live for SOOOOOOOOOOO long so that means Matt Smith can return as the Eleventh Doctor during that long life span like during his time on Trenzalore!!! 💙💙

The "I don't want to go" line actually makes sense now, because of how short 10s life was

Although Capaldi is technically 4 and a half billion years old, he's only 2200 years old if you don't count his clone being the same age over and over

The 9th doctor had to at least have lasted a few decades as that is how long he spent getting back to rose in the audiobook the other side plus he traveled alone before he met rose which is when the pictures that clave had where taken.

Personally I would add a year on the tenth doctor because of the year he spent with the master in the sound of the drums (and maybe add some more because it seemed like he spent a few years during the specials and inbetween on his own) And the ninth doctor had loads more bc in rose there was all those pics of his adventures before he met rose and he only commented on his ears in that ep bc he refused to look at his face for so long only looking at it after he met rose

Wow, no wonder the 11th Doctor wanted to stay on Trenzalore. If you’re on your last life, and your last two went by tragically fast, it’d make sense to savor that as much as possible.

My theory on why the 9th Doctor has only 1 year is that if he is straight out of the time war he might have a disregard to his own life and thus not be as careful as other Doctors. I mean he did just kill off his entire race (or so he thought). The 11th doctor may have lived for so long as he thought it was his final regeneration so any mortal injury would result in death as opposed to regeneration. I would certainly be a lot more careful if I was the 11th Doctor. The doctor does also say that he’s so old that he doesn’t remember if he’s lying about his age.

Shouldn’t the Twelfth Doctor be the longest? He lived for billions of years according to Heaven Sent.

Does 12’s stint in Heaven Sent not go towards how long he lived. I know it was groundhog day and reset but his character spent billions of years in the confession dial. I’ve always considered it to be the perfect retcon as to the Doctor’s age which (in my opinion) shouldn’t really matter to the plot and seemed to be a contentious point in canon. This is a very interesting piece of work though!

this graph makes sense. the doctor started out life, from 1 through 7 we see a decrease, 2 being perhaps more cautious, 3 4 5 6 7 living more recklessly, then 8 finds out about a prophecy or something i forgot the lore, and runs more then he has ever run before, the war doctor was there for the length of the timewar, it is often hinted at the fact he played more of an officer role and thus would have more protection, after its over ptsd hits and 9 and 10 are thrusted into other peoples lives harder then they ever have been before, its intoxicating but its how they cope, with 9 i doubt he even has a mere couple of adventures inbetween the ones we see with rose, the pictures he showed at the begining being his coping mechanisms before her, and thus he is dragged through the hell 'doctor' lifestyle more- where other incarnations have had time to just live, similarly 10 is the same, from one distructive companion to the next, but he finally has matured from the timewar, and thus 11 comes, thinking its his last, lives more, it is very obvious he has many an adventure inbetween what we see, even many without his companions, and so he lives the longest, but by miracle it wasnt his last, and 12 realises he has no idea how long he will last regeneration-wise so he lives like 3 through 7 again.

You are now one of my new favorite channels, subscription applied.

Rule #1: The Doctor lies. Even when it seems like he's telling the truth. These approximations are all based off of what he tells us.

I thought that Capaldi lived for around four and a half billion years as he was stuck in the confession dial

another brilliant video! this is such a great time for your channel!!!!!!

10:40 did he forget about the 4.5billion years when he was jailed in the confession dial, because the time lords wanted to know about the hybrid.

I'll have to go see your previous videos. Unless you count the so far off-the-record years recently introduced, whatever the f@ck was up with the Curator, and the billions of years Twelve spent being reconstituted in "Heaven Sent, the longest life would have to be Eleven, if only for his years on Trenzalore...final answer. I agree with your assessments about Two's years years in service to the Timelords, the War Doctor starting his count over, and the appallingly short lives of Nine and Ten. I suspect that Five got cheated a bit too. Great work!

Absolutely Magnificent Video Matthew. It really puts it all in perspective with the 8th living hundreds of years but the 4th only living around 60 odd years. I truly respect your effort with research. In terms of thirteen’s age, I’d say she’s around 1-2 years old so far as there is a gap between resolution and Spyfall. Also it’s confirmed that Woman Who fell to Earth is set in September 2018, Resolution on January 1st 2019, and Spyfall during 2020, and with her seeking the master in series 12, that’s why I think she’s currently around 2 years old

The 𝗪𝐚𝐫𝐫𝐢𝐨𝐫 was 800 years old when he regenerated. 𝐍𝐢𝐧𝐭𝐡 departed from the cul-de-sac and lived a whole hundred years more, before returning to fetch Rose in the 2005 pilot.

This is fascinating! Now I need to catch up with the other videos on your channel (yeah, including the one that I was supposed to stop this one to watch first; not so good at following rules! :) ).

Well, 3 regenerated into 4 at the age of 748 as the Fourth Doctor states in _A Device of Death._

With The 12th Doctor being 2,100-2194, I'm gonna say The 13th Doctor is between 2,195 & 2,200. She could be older than that. I'd give her a nice even number. 3,000 years for 13. If she mentions her age at any point in time next series, we'll all find out for sure.

I believe the Ninth Doctor spent 100 years traveling before meeting Rose and refusing to ever look at himself in a mirror fir that long because he thought that he ‘killed’ the Time Lords and Time Ladies.

Personally, I always thought that each doctor only counted their own age, giving the Doctor a far longer life in general, which helps explain how he's seen so much of the universe. Any and all inconsistencies are explained by each Doctor beginning the count again, or gaps in their timeline we aren't aware of, such as how long the 9th Doctor travelled without Rose between her turning down his offer and him coming back for her. Even if this doesn't work perfectly, it might be the case for some of the Doctors and not others. I don't know. This was just always my headcannon