As you’ve likely heard, the human body quickly begins to shut down in the absence of both food and water.
A high estimate would state that in the best-case scenario, a person may be able to survive without water for 14 days. More realistically, most people would succumb to dehydration after 3 days or less.
However, there is a less finite answer to how long one can survive without food, but with access to water.
Some estimates state that most people have enough caloric energy stores to last them between 1 and 2 months. Thus, it follows that most people who die from hunger strikes do so in the second half of the second month.
However, there are some outliers who have conquered this limitation.
One famous was Terence James MacSwiney. MacSwiney was an Irish political prisoner who, in 1920, set a record during a hunger strike when he lived without food for 74 days before ultimately perishing to his condition.
However, MacSwiney pales in comparison to a man named Angus Barbieri.
In 1965 and 1966, Barbieri made history by fasting for a whopping 382 days.
Aided only by the consumption of electrolytes and vitamins, he managed to lose 276 pounds during this period, aiding in a physical transformation that left him looking like a different man altogether:
Ultimately, while the amount of time one can survive on only water depends on many factors, none are quite as important as the amount of energy stored in your own body to begin with.