When Roman architect Lucius is criticized for his “outdated” thermae designs, he retreats to the local bath to collect his thoughts. All Lucius wants is to recapture the Rome of earlier days, when one could enjoy a relaxing bath without the pressure of merchants and roughhousing patrons. Slipping deeper into the warm water, Lucius is suddenly caught in the suction and dragged through the drainage at the bottom of the bath! He emerges coughing and sputtering amid a group of strange-looking foreigners with the most peculiar bathhouse customs... over 1,500 years in the future in modern-day Japan! His contemporaries wanted him to modernize, and so, borrowing the customs of these mysterious bath-loving people, Lucius opens what quickly becomes the most popular new bathhouse in Rome—Thermae Romae!

Thermae Romae won the third Manga Taisho Award in 2010.

The series was published in English by Yen Press as hardcover 2-in-1 omnibus volumes from November 20, 2012, to February 25, 2014. The publisher later released a 6-in-1 omnibus volume. It was also published in Italian by Edizioni Star Comics from October 22, 2011, to January 18, 2014; and in Brazilian Portuguese by Editora JBC from August 2013 to March 2014.

A live-action film adaptation was released in Japan on April 28, 2012, and was that year's 2nd highest-grossing domestic film.