In North America, both manga series have been licensed by Dark Horse Comics. A second anime television series adaptation by Orange, titled Trigun Stampede, premiered in January 2023. An anime feature film, Trigun: Badlands Rumble, premiered in Japan in April 2010. Trigun was adapted into a 26-episode anime television series by Madhouse it aired on TV Tokyo from April to September 1998. Nightow wanted Vash to be different from cowboys in Western movies by avoiding killing enemies and instead exploring the characters involved in each story arc. Trigun originated from Nightow's fascination with Western movies.

As the narrative progresses, Vash's past is explored. Set on the fictional planet known as No Man's Land, the plot follows Vash the Stampede, a famous gunman who is constantly fighting bounty hunters seeking to obtain the immense bounty on his head. Shōnen Gahosha republished the Trigun chapters in two volumes, and collected the Trigun Maximum chapters in 14 volumes. The series continued its publication in Shōnen Gahosha's seinen manga magazine Young King OURs, under the title Trigun Maximum, from October 1997 to March 2007. Its chapters were then collected in three tankōbon volumes.

It was first serialized in Tokuma Shoten's shōnen manga magazine Monthly Shōnen Captain from April 1995 to January 1997 when the magazine ceased its publication. Trigun is a Japanese manga series written and illustrated by Yasuhiro Nightow.

Trigun by Dark Horse Comics