Kagome Higurashi is the female protagonist and narrator of the series. Aged 15 (which is in 9th grade) and therefore the youngest of the group. She is a beautiful, bold, kind and warm-hearted girl. She goes out of her way to help people, and teaches InuYasha to display kindness. She is emotionally and spiritually the strongest in the group and often uses her powers when her friends are in danger. She invited Mirōku, Shippō, Sangō, Kirara, and even Kagura (who declined), to join her and InuYasha on their quest to collect the jewel shards and defeat Naraku. She is extremely tolerant in dealing with Inuyasha's pettiness, though the two argue quite a bit. Her kind attitude resulted in many men (Kōga, Hōjō etc.) strongly falling romantically in love with her. Her heart is pure, although a speck of darkness is found later in the series that is caused by her jealousy of the priestess Kikyō, who InuYasha loved. Despite this, Kagome always saved and showed kindness to Kikyō when given the chance. She becomes much more strong and skilled in archery as the series progresses, and eventually learns to master her immensely strong spiritual powers.

Aged fifteen at the start of the series, she is a middle-school student born in the Fall of 1982 in modern Japan. She is the reincarnation of the deceased (and later reawakened) priestess Kikyō, and thus resembles the priestess in looks. Kagome has the Sacred Jewel of Four Spirits unknowingly hidden inside her body until her fifteenth birthday, when a demon pulls her into the Bone Eater's Well at her family's shrine and takes her five hundred years back through time.

They emerge in the Feudal Era about fifty years after Kikyō's death, where the demon tears the Jewel from Kagome's body. She releases InuYasha from his seal, and he defeats the demon, but after the awakening murder, attempts to slaughter Kagome for the Jewel. Kaede, Kikyō's younger sister, uses her great spiritual power to force a necklace onto InuYasha, so InuYasha and Kagome are bound by the artifact. The Jewel's power proves to be a very strong lure for evil. When the Crow Demon seizes the Sacred Jewel, Kagome attempts to stop it with a longbow and arrow, but in doing so, accidentally shatters the jewel into numerous fragments that disperse throughout Japan. She agrees to help find them, as she can sense the presence of nearby shards, and InuYasha comes along as protector and companion (and, ostensibly, so he can steal the jewel from her when it's complete, though he makes no secret of this).

As the series progresses, she begins to deeply fall in love with InuYasha, and finds herself competing with the revived Kikyō for his romantic love and affections. Near the end of the series Kagome finds herself trapped in the sacred jewel. She has to make a decision that could make or break the world that she knows and loves, with just one final wish. With the help of InuYasha by her side, Kagome wishes away the jewel saving the world around and is sent back to her own time. Three years later, eighteen-year old Kagome returns to the Feudal Era after completing her High School years and meets up with InuYasha once again. As a result of that, she marries InuYasha. She becomes a priestess and lives with him for the rest of her life.