Height: 179 cm (5'10")

Light is a third year high school student (12th Grade) at Daikoku Private Academy who also attends supplemental classes at Gamou Prep Academy in the beginning of the story. Light has a father, Soichiro Yagami, who is the head of the Police Force. Light also has a mother, Sachiko Yagami, and a younger sister, Sayu Yagami. In Spring 2004, he becomes a first-year student (freshman) at To-Oh University and gets one of the top scores of its entrance exam.

Nicknamed "Kira", he uses the Death Note to create his ideal world of justice under him; its new God. Though he looks frail, Light is an extremely athletic person, with an aptitude to find an opponent's weak point. He is a genius, which adds to his notion that only he is fit to judge humanity and steer it on a proper moral course.