Saruman (Christopher Lee) in Lord of the Rings looks very old, but appearances can be deceiving in Middle-earth - so how old is Saruman really? With so many of the Lord of the Rings cast of characters ranging massively in age - sometimes with a difference of several thousand years - this question only becomes more interesting. This is doubly true for the fact that Saruman has an extensive history in the franchise, making it clear that his age does have some narrative importance.
Saruman's role in the Lord of the Rings movies is to be a secondary antagonist to Sauron, making things yet harder for the Fellowship of the Ring. One of his groups of orcs and Uruk-hai ends up causing the demise of Boromir (Sean Bean) and kidnapping Merry (Dominic Monaghan) and Pippin (Billy Boyd). These actions ironically lead to Saruman's downfall, since Merry and Pippin escape from their captors and convince the Ents to attack Isengard. After Isengard is destroyed, and Gandalf (Ian McKellen), Théoden (Bernard Hill), and the remaining members of the Fellowship arrive, Gandalf breaks Saruman's staff. In the extended version of the movie, Gandalf wants to interrogate Saruman, but Gríma Wormtongue (Brad Dourif) slays him before Gandalf gets the chance.
In both the Lord of the Rings movies and the books, Saruman is definitely more than 1,000 years old. Finding out his actual age is complicated because, in the timeline of Lord of the Rings books, he is a Maia, which means that he was created before the creation of Arda, or the Earth, arriving in Middle-earth around the year 1000 of the Third Age. Like all wizards in Lord of the Rings, Saruman was sent by the Valar to help the people of Middle-earth defeat Sauron, though he ended up allying with the villain instead. Even if viewers only counted his lifetime on Middle-earth, Saruman is still extremely old. He arrived in Middle-earth long before the events of Lord of the Rings and was around for much of The Hobbit as well. In the Lord of the Rings books, the White Council started in 2463 of the Third Age, but Saruman was around since the year 1000 of the Third Age. When the White Council started, he was therefore in Middle-earth for 1,463 years. By the time the events of Lord of the Rings start, he has been in Middle-earth for 2,001 years. By the time he meets his demise in the extended version of the movie Lord of the Rings: Return of the King, he has been in Middle-earth for 2,019 years.
In the Lord of the Rings books, things end differently for him. After the Ents destroy Isengard, Saruman convinces them to let him go by handing over the keys to Orthanc. He then heads to the Shire and takes it over. He is eventually overthrown by Frodo Baggins (Elijah Wood) and his friends and is then slain by Gríma Wormtongue. These events, however, are left out of the movie adaptation of Lord of the Rings, where Saruman's demise at the hands of Gríma means his death happens a bit earlier. That said, in both the Lord of the Rings books and movies, Saruman was in Middle-earth for around 2,019 years before finally being destroyed.
Saruman's age is indeed a very complicated matter. All Lord of the Rings viewers can know for sure is that he was in Middle-earth for about 2,019 years, and that he was created before the world existed. While this means he isn't the oldest character in the Lord of the Rings, he's also by no means the youngest - which makes sense given the extensive backstory his character has in both the original books and the movie adaptations.