When was Dumbledore born and how old was he in the ‘Harry Potter’ books and movies?

The Wizarding World of Harry Potter has many characters, young and old, through hundreds of years of fictional history. In fact, seeing as Hogwarts was founded in 993, there is a millennium’s worth of history in the franchise. With ancillary titles like Hogwarts Legacy to fill in the gaps of time, or periods of history that were not covered in the original material, there is a wealth of information to sort through, and most of it can be vague. 

There are many characters throughout the franchise that have lived for hundreds of years, for example, there are multiple ghosts, and who could forget Nicolas Flamel, who was nearly 700 when he eventually died during the events of Harry Potter. When you think of older characters throughout the franchise, there is one that automatically flies into your head; Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore. During the events of Harry Potter, Dumbledore was the Headmaster of Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry, after being the Professor of Defense Against the Dark Arts and then the Transfiguration Professor for a number of years.

Over the course of watching the movies or reading the books, you might have wondered just how old Dumbledore was, just like Harry and his friends did at one point. So let’s take a look and let you know when Albus was born, and his various ages throughout different points in the franchise.

How old is Albus Dumbledore?

Dumbledore’s birthday is not specified in the Harry Potter books, and so fans have found clues that suggest when his birthday might have been. First of all, the old Pottermore website listed Dumbledore’s year of birth as 1881. The son of Kendra and Percival Dumbledore, Albus’ mother would die in 1899, while his father was imprisoned in Azkaban for attacking muggles who attacked Dumbledore’s sister Ariana. 

One of the chapters in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, “The Life and Lies of Albus Dumbledore,” contains an expert from Rita Skeeter’s book of the same name. It mentions that Dumbledore was near his 18th birthday when he left Hogwarts, so he was 17 in 1899, and his birthday needed to be after June for his enrollment to make sense. The accepted answer is that Albus was born in August or July. 

Chronologically, the first film in the saga that Dumbledore appears in is Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Dumbledore. This movie takes place in 1927, which makes Jude Law’s version of the character 45 years old. Law playing the professor then makes sense because the character is decades younger than he was during the events of Harry Potter, and the actor is roughly the same age. The Harry Potter books and films take place many years after Fantastic Beasts, starting in 1980, when Harry Potter was born.

The First Wizarding War, when Dumbledore assembled the Order of the Phoenix against Voldemort and his Death Eaters, occurred in 1970, so he was already 89 years old. By the time Harry Potter was born Dumbledore was either 89 or 88, depending on the month of the old wizard’s birthday, as Harry was born on July 31, 1980. When Harry started attending Hogwarts at the age of 11, Dumbledore should have just turned 110 years old. 

Dumbledore was played by Richard Harris in the first two films. He died before the third film and so the role was taken up by Michael Gambon. Gambon was 64 years old when he first played the character in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, while Harris was 71 when Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s/Sorcerer’s Stone was released. 

Finally, in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, when Severus Snape killed him at the top of the Astronomy Tower, Albus Dumbledore died at the age of 115. He lived a long life, through multiple wars, while battling multiple dark wizards and collecting all of the Deathly Hallows. He also managed to be Headmaster of Hogwarts for roughly 30 years and taught many students across two different subjects. 

So, that’s how old Dumbledore was during all of Harry Potter. You have to wonder how much longer he would have lived if he was not killed by Snape, or if he was not dying already from attempting to use the Resurrection Stone, which Voldemort had cursed. Still, he did manage to live a full, albeit fictional life, one that might have been as long as his beard.