Detective Conan is the main character of the homonymous manga series, enjoying great international popularity since 1994. His father is a world famous crime writer and his mother a former successful actress. The family has been living in America for three years.

The series is about the 17-year-old high school student and brilliant amateur detective Shin'ichi Kudo, who is knocked down during an investigation of a Men in Black case.

He was administered a capsule with cytotoxin - APTX 4869 -, which was to actually kill him. Instead, his body became about 10 years younger. His strength and size decreased but his mind remained unaltered.

He now turns to his friend and neighbour, Professor Agasa. She is always on Shin'ichi’s side, providing him with the latest technological inventions. The professor is also the only one who knows that Shin'ichi is now 6 years old. It would be dangerous if any other accomplices found out, since it would endanger Shin'ichis friends and family.

To perfect his cover, Shin'ichi is now called "Conan Edogawa". This name is composed of the name of the British writer Arthur Conan Doyle and the Japanese writer Edogawa Rampo.

His childhood friend, Ran Mori, noticed the little boy when passing by the professor in search for Shin'ichi. Since Conan looks like Shin'ichi as a small boy, he puts on his father's glasses as camouflage.

Conan introduces himself to Ran and his father, Kogoro Mori, as an unsuccessful private investigator who previously worked for the police. He was suspended because of a fatal error. From there, Conan hopes to obtain more information about the Men in Black, so as to be able to destroy the evil organization of black men and obtain the antidote. He also assisted from now on by Mori to solve his cases, or better, uncover them.

This turns out to be quite difficult and his disguises are sometimes threatened to blow up in his face. Especially Ran often draws the suspicion that Shin'ichi and Ran are secretly in love with each other.

To his chagrin, Conan must now go back to elementary school. Conan founded the club "Detective Boys" with his classmates Ayumi Yoshida, Genta Kojima and Mitsuhiko Tsuburaya. Conan also solves some tricky cases with them, though mostly independently.

In later episodes, Conan receives help from Shiho Miyano, nicknamed Sherry. She was the one who developed the poisonous substance APTX 4869 and was a member of the Organization of Black Men. But when her sister died, she also took cytotoxin – APTX 4869 - to punish herself and was turned into a child again. Under the name Ai Haibara, she lives with Professor Agasa, is in the same class as Conan and is also a member of the Detective Boys.

Another person who is familiar with Shin'ichi’s secret is student detective Heiji Hattori from Osaka. He keeps it to himself, though.

Over time, Conan reveals more and more secrets and facts about the secret organization. He also learns that an employee of the CIA and the FBI is behind the Organization of Black Men and gets to know some of his co-workers.