Setting/place

A view of Seireitei in Soul Society.

The planes of existence in the Bleach universe broadly correspond to the life and afterlife of human belief systems. The living humans of Bleach reside in a world resembling the present day; buried souls live in a kind of Heaven called Soul Society; evil souls are sent to Hell. Once in Soul Society, a spirit is able to live longer than humans in the living world, with many aging into the thousands of years. Once a spirit dies in Soul Society, its soul is sent back to the living world and reborn as a new human. This provides the two worlds with balance.

* Human world: The human world of Bleach is modern Japan, specifically, a fictional area of Western Tokyo called Karakura Town. In this world, Ichigo attends school and fights hollows. Places of note are the high school, the Urahara Shop, the river where Ichigo's mother was killed, the cemetery, Karakura Hospital, and Ichigo and Orihime's homes.

* Soul Society: Soul Society consists of an expansive walled city (Seireitei, "Court of Pure Souls"), in the center and four regions, each with 80 districts, outside of it. The districts outside of the Seireitei are known as the Rukongai ("Town of Wandering Spirits") and are the place where non-shinigami and commoners live. The district number of the Rukongai (ranging from 1 to 80) also describes its conditions. District 1, the closest to Seireitei, is peaceful and orderly, while the most distant District 80 is filled with criminals and has the poorest living conditions. A king resides in another realm within Soul Society.
* Hueco Mundo: Hueco Mundo is the desert-like area between the human world and Soul Society. Literally meaning "hollow world" (the word hueco can also mean "empty"), it is where hollows reside when not hunting in the human world or Soul Society, and where they are undetectable. Entrances to Hueco Mundo are created by ripping the dimensional fabric between the two worlds.
* Hell: Hell is the destination of those who committed unforgivably evil acts during their lives in the human world. When a hollow whose mortal soul is too wicked to enter Soul Society is slain by a zanpakutō, the gates of hell (giant doors held by skeletons) appear and begin to open. A giant, laughing spiritual being with a blade spears the wicked spirit and drags it down into hell.

Bleach characters move from world to world by several means. Shinigami open passages between worlds by means of their zanpakutō. Butterflies created during soul burial, called hell butterflies, make these routes safe. Human souls usually cross between planes only through birth into the human world or soul burial by shinigami. Living humans can also use special portals to move between worlds, but this is dangerous. While hollows are portrayed as able to move between planes at will by opening rifts in space, they usually remain in Hueco Mundo due to the risk of discovery in Soul Society or the human world. Encounters between characters crossing realms are a driving plot force in Bleach.