Recently, fans of Dragon Ball have been bringing up the question, "do Saiyans have the ability to breathe in space?" Here, I have the answer for you. The quick answer is no but I will explain my answer.
In several scenes of Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z, Goku has been in space for short while. Frieza has told Goku that Saiyans are unable to survive in space. Frieza however has the ability to do so, also Cell, Majin Buu, and Beerus. When talking about this subject, fans begin using the word "breathe". Breathing and surviving are two different things. First of all, there's no air in space. Space is a vacuum so there's nothing to breathe in there.
Now let's begin with Dragon Ball. Goku has encountered Monster Carrot and his gang. Goku beat him by using the Power Pole an used to take Monster Carrot and his gang to the moon. Before we start talking about this, at first, Dragon Ball was a gag manga from the start so most of this stuff wasn't taken seriously. Now fans are bringing this up. This still goes along what I am talking about. Continuing, King Kai also agrees with Frieza that Saiyans are unable to survive in space because he tells the Z-Fighters to not revive Goku because Namek has been destroyed and he was thought to be dead. In the recent Battle of Gods, Goku and Beerus fight in "space" but in the Earth's stratosphere, where there's air but little. However, at the end of Resurrection F, Whis says that Frieza can survive in space. What's going on here?
Notice the word I put in bold, survive. It seems that Saiyans are able to be in space for a short period of time. For example, taking Moster Carrot to the moon. If they thought Goku was dead and had no knowledge of Namek's destruction, Goku wouldn't be able to travel in space to get to Earth. He would have died. Next time you see someone say breathe whe talking about this subject, mention to them it's survive and Saiyans aren't able to survive.