In case it may help, here's the Wikipedia article about the production, which covers number of episodes, t.v.-broadcast duration of each episode, as well as total duration of different versions: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sh%C5%8Dgun_(1980_miniseries)

I watched the miniseries during its original t.v. airing back in 1980 and definitely consider it to be 5 (not 10) episodes.

Having said that, on the IMDb page, if you scroll down to the place for Technical Specifications, it states: "Runtime: 60 min (10 episodes)". So IMDb actually indicates the miniseries to be both 5 episodes and 10 episodes, depending on where on the page you look.

Perhaps the miniseries had opening/closing credits, anew, at the beginning/end of each hour during the t.v. broadcasts. That doesn't seem particularly likely, but I guess is possible (for international syndication purposes, so networks/channels would be able to broadcast the miniseries however many hours at a time they'd wish).

We only support the original version. So it has to stay 5 episodes unless someone can prove without a doubt it originally was released as 10.

plus the "movie" ? https://www.themoviedb.org/movie/529239-shogun https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0083069/

That one should be fine as an exception. We have a few similar cases.

something is wrong

5 x "Runtime 60m" = 300 min. or 5 hours (themoviedb)

"Running time 62 min." (wikipedia)

547 min or 9 hr 7 min (blu-ray)

(wikipedia) "The DVD release has no episode breaks and is divided over 4 discs, with bonus features on disc 5.

DVD release: September 30, 2003 Feature length: 547 minutes"

I think blu-ray is the same but on "Three-disc set" = like 1 very long "movie"

disc 1 = 2:51 hours

disc 2 = 3:31 hours

disc 3 = 3:17 hours

@thermo6 I doubled the runtime.

well that is not correct https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sh%C5%8Dgun_(1980_miniseries)#Episode_guide +"Running time 62 min. 180 min. (premiere/finale)"

ep 1 and 5 was about 3 hours episodes and ep 2-4 about 60 min., so runtime 60m AND 180m ?

BUT, other info on the internet say the total airtime was about 12-13 hours (720-780min.)

normal 60min show is more like 42-45min (no commercials) 720min. - commercials = ~540 min.

so looks like "runtime 60m AND 180m" is the way to go ?

@thermo6 The bar and the episode guide have different runtimes. I really don't trust them.

I'm having the german Blu-Ray 3-disc set and was confused how to name the episodes, too.

Disc 1 02:50:54 (with intro / no outro)

Disc 2 03:00:51 (no intro / no outro)

Disc 3 (no intro / with outro) 01:37:16 + 01:40:14 = 03:17:30 in total (two clips)

Although Disc 1 and Disc 3 should be the "opener" and "finale" as stated in wikipedia it looks like one huge movie for me as every chapter on all discs fade to black. This means you could f.e. split the "3hr opener" easily in 14 episodes alone. But as wikipedia states "The DVD release has no episode breaks" there could be intros+outros on every TV airing.

Finally I decided to merge all clips to one big movie and named it "S01E01-E05" for Plex. Now it has a total length of 09:09:17

EDIT: The german wiki has more details regarding the different episode counts: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shogun_(Fernsehserie)#Anmerkungen

Weitere Ausstrahlungen waren
- 7 Folgen à 60 Min. (ZDF, 1986 und 1990)
- 5 Folgen (DDR-Fernsehen, 6. Mai bis 3. Juni 1988)
- 11 Folgen à 45 Min. (Sat.1, 1992)
-  Spielfilm, 142 Min. (ProSieben, 1993 und 1994)
- 5 Folgen, 90–110 Min. (NDR, 2004; Anixe, 2008)
- 11 Folgen à 45 Min. (Arte, März/April 2010)
In der orig. Englischen Version:
- 5 Folgen = Eröffnungsfolge 3 Stunden, 3 Folgen à 62 min., Letzte Folge 3 Stunden - USA Erstausstrahlung war vom 15. – 19. September 1980
- Als DVD-Veröffentlichung 10 Folgen à 60 min.

This explains why TVDB lists 10 episodes (english DVD release).