Dragon Ball Z Kai is a recut version of the long running sequel anime television series Dragon Ball Z, produced to commemorate its 20th anniversary. The anime series was produced by Toei Animation with the intention of creating a revised version of Dragon Ball Z with re-recorded dialogue, improved animation cel quality and omission of most anime exclusive content not found in the Z-covered half of Akira Toriyama's original Dragon Ball manga. The series was originally broadcast in Japan on Fuji TV from April 5, 2009, to March 27, 2011, with follow-up continuation covering the remaining story arcs from the original manga airing in Japan from April 6, 2014, to June 28, 2015.

Kai features remastered high definition picture, sound, and special effects as well as a re-recorded voice track by most of the original cast. As most of the series' sketches and animation cels had been discarded since the final episode of Dragon Ball Z in 1996, new frames were produced by digitally tracing over still frames from existing footage and filling them with softer colors. This reduced visible damage to the original animation. To convert the 4:3 animation to 16:9 widescreen, some shots were selectively cropped while others feature new hand drawn portions; an uncropped 4:3 version was made available on home video and international releases for the first 98 episodes. Some countries would also air it in 4:3. Much of the anime-original material that was not featured in the manga was cut from Kai (ultimately abridging the 291 episodes of Dragon Ball Z down to 159 in Japan and 167 internationally).

The series would return in 2014, running for an additional 61 episodes in Japan, and 69 episodes internationally. The international version of the 2014 series was titled Dragon Ball Z Kai: The Final Chapters by Toei Europe and Funimation, and had initially only been earmarked for broadcast outside of Japan. The home media releases of The Final Chapters contain a Japanese audio track for all episodes, including those that were never broadcast in Japan.

The first DVD and Blu-ray compilation was released in Japan on September 18, 2009. Individual volumes and Blu-ray box sets were released monthly. France was the first country to release all 167 episodes of the series on DVD and Blu-ray.