I’ve done it, I broke the code. I know exactly what you have to do to come up with a super popular anime character. I bet you want to know the secret as well. I can’t believe I’m giving this stuff away for free!
I once wrote a post about the most popular characters in anime. I went through a bunch of lists and compiled the results to get a sort of normalized top 5 or top 10 anime characters of all time. It was a good way to see what anime fans beyond our very specialized bubble of anime bloggers or the anitwitter /anitube world that is way more focused on new seasonal anime. I was trying to get a more general insight into what anime fans like.
And I figured it would be great to update that list now that a few years have passed. To see if there are any significant changes. Isn’t that a great idea for a post? I know that I tend to enjoy writing these sorts of posts a little more than you guys like reading them but I figure maybe there’s someone else out there like me!
But then tragedy struck!
I can’t find that old post anywhere on my site. Did I just dream about writing that post! I really need to keep my site more organized! There are roughly 2300 posts on this site and it can be a real pain to find something when I need it. I try to be consistent with my tags but you know… Life happens.
So instead of a comparison, you’re just getting the updated results and some of my dim recollections! We’re professionals here!
(In case any marketing people come across this – we are definitely not professionals here or even ‘we’s. My blog is completely unmonetized. Thank you!)
So for this updated list, I started by consulting my old friend and nemesis Google. I typed the following searches: Top all-time best anime characters, Most popular anime characters, Favourite anime characters. I chose the first results of sites that had at least 10 characters. I decided to choose 10 sites for a possible total of 100 characters (or just 10 if every list was identical)
Here are the results:
- 1. Levi
- 2. L
- 3. Killua
- 4. Lelouche
- 5. Monkey D Luffy
- 6. Okabe Rintaro
- 7. Eren Yaeger
- 8. Light Yagami
- 9. Edward Elrich
- 10. Gintoki
https://www.entoin.com/entertainment/anime-characters
- 1. Lelouche
- 2. Levi
- 3. L
- 4. Luffy
- 5. Zoro
- 6. Light Yagami
- 7. Okabe Rintaro
- 8. Killua
- 9. Edward Elrich
- 10. Naruto
https://www.cbr.com/most-popular-anime-characters/
- 1. Naruto
- 2. Itachi Uchiha
- 3. Kakashi
- 4. Levi
- 5. Killua
- 6. Minato Namikaze
- 7. Luffy
- 8. Jiraiya
- 9. Edward Elrich
- 10. Saitama
https://www.ranker.com/crowdranked-list/my-top-10-favorite-anime-characters
- 1. L
- 2. Edward Elrich
- 3. Vegeta
- 4. Goku
- 5. Naruto
- 6. Luffy
- 7. Spike Spiegel
- 8. Levi
- 9. Kakashi
- 10. Itachi Uchiha
https://www.thetoptens.com/animes/top-anime-characters/
- 1. Lelouche
- 2. Levi
- 3. L
- 4. Luffy
- 5. Zoro
- 6. Light Yagami
- 7. Okabe Rintaro
- 8. Killua
- 9. Edward Elrich
- 10. Naruto
*** same a CBR list
https://animegalaxyofficial.com/top-20-most-popular-anime-characters-of-all-time-ranked/
- 1. Lelouche
- 2. Johan Liebert
- 3. Okabe Rintaro
- 4. Light Yagami
- 5. Edward Elrich
- 6. Gon
- 7. Kamina
- 8. Zoro
- 9. Nana Osaki
- 10. Eren Yeager
https://www.fandomspot.com/best-anime-main-characters/
- 1. Shinji (Eva)
- 2. Spike Spiegel
- 3. Goku
- 4. Astro
- 5. Kenshin
- 6. Johan Liebert
- 7. Light Yagami
- 8. Edward Elrich
- 9. Nausicaä
- 10. Vegeta
https://www.ign.com/articles/2014/02/04/top-25-greatest-anime-characters
- 1. Lelouche
- 2. Levi
- 3. Satoru Gojo
- 4. L
- 5. Killua
- 6. Luffy
- 7. Naruto
- 8. Okabe Rintaro
- 9. Eren Yeager
- 10. Light Yagami
https://www.animesoulking.com/2021/12/09/anime-characters/
- 1. Goku
- 2. Kenshin
- 3. L
- 4. Lelouche
- 5. Saitama
- 6. Edward Elrich
- 7. Luffy
- 8. Vash
- 9. Naruto
- 10. Levi
https://infocopse.com/top-10-anime-characters/
- 1. Lelouche
- 2. Levi
- 3. L
- 4. Luffy
- 5. Zoro
- 6. Light
- 7. Okabe
- 8. Killua
- 9. Edward Elrich
- 10. Naruto.
As you can see, there is a lot of cross-over. Ranker (which had quite a few Naruto characters) is a site where people can just log in and vote so it’s a raw uncurated list based on the tastes of whoever decides to vote but they do have a pretty huge sample size and their list isn’t that different from anyone else’s. This said, Not all sites gave us much detail on how they compiled their lists and I did notice that the CBR and Anime Galaxy Lists were identical (same picks in the same order). So some of these lists may be using each other as sources creating a sort of feedback loop which could also explain the similarities.
From what I can remember, L was the most popular character last time I did this. And he’s still quite popular on these lists. However, I don’t remember any Attack on Titan representation at the time but the popularity of the show in the last few years has really made some characters stand out for anime fans. I may be misremembering, but I think there is a lot more One Piece on these lists as well.
One Piece has been airing for a really long time and it’s been consistently popular so I really wanted to see if I am remembering correctly. If I’m right, that means that One Piece has enjoyed a spike in popularity in the last few years and I wonder why.
Okabe, Edward Elrich and Killua have also been consistently popular as well as Lelouche but I do think Lelouche is a bit more popular this time around than LAST TIME…I think… Again, I have no clue why that would be but I did watch Code Geass between the two posts so maybe other people did as well!
But what can we learn about anime fans from these results? And let’s not take it too seriously, It’s a highly unscientific analysis.
For one, the majority of these characters are from action-shonen anime. This was the same last time. There’s no real surprise there. Shonen is the most popular ‘genre’ of anime by far and action shonen tends to dominate. Depending on how touchy you are about genre, you could argue that Steins;Gate and FMA aren’t exactly action shonen but I think they are close enough. They certainly have a lot of the same tropes, narrative structure and character archetypes.
In fact, the only shows represented in these lists that aren’t action shonen are Rourouni Kenshin (technically a shojo but I wouldn’t blame you for thinking it was a historical action shonen, I did), Monster (a psychological thriller Seinen), Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (an action-adventure fantasy) and Nana (a romance shojo). However, these shows are really underrepresented, most only having a single entry through the 100.
Oh, I looked it up, did you know Cowboy Bebop is also a shojo? I didn’t know. I think Japanese distributors may be randomly assigning demographics…
Recent discoveries aside, Shonen still dominates these lists by far.
Another thing that hasn’t changed is that it’s a real sausage fest. Out of 100 possible picks, there are only two female characters. Nausicaä and Nana. Both of them only appear once and both are leading characters in popular franchises. FMA has amazing female characters and I personally have always liked Misa Misa but apparently, fans hate her. All we get are these two ladies? ‘Cmon, we can do better than this, can’t we?
Also, both these ladies have names that start with the letter N, Coincidence? There are no such things as coincidences!
Don’t believe me? Well If I were to do a top 5 of the names that appear most often on these lists I bet it would look a little something like this: Lelouche, L, Levi, Light, Luffy. Notice anything. Heck, we could even throw in Johan Liebert.
That’s right, anime fans like characters whose names start with the letter L. That’s it. It was so easy all this time. Guys should start with the letter L and ladies should start with the letter N. That’s all there is to it.
I don’t think there’s even a point in going on. Sure more than half of the characters on the list are the mastermind archetype. But that’s probably a coincidence. What do you mean there are no such things as coincidences?
Nice
Err. Sorry to puncture your theory, but Vegeta is my favorite character. But I’m glad that at least we got one character from Monster, even though I personally think that Tenma is a better character overall than Johan.
Also, kind of sad to see Ryoko is not in these lists. But then again, given how strange Kill La Kill was, and how short it was in comparison of these shows, it doesn’t surprise me.
When I think about it, there may actually be something behind the “L” names in Japanese media. When Japanese words and names are Romanized, the Japanese sound that’s closest to “L” is generally written as “R” so seeing an “L” stands out as, “Look at this – they/it aren’t an everyday Japanese person/thing.” We’re beginning to see the sound that is normally written as “Ko” Romanized in girls’ names as “Co” too (Ochaco, Emilico.) The “L” and “C” might be the equivalent of how “mysterious” things in English-language media use lots of “X”‘s and “Q”‘s.
That might have something to do with it. I do think that considering the sources, these are the fave characters of English speaking audiences though, making the L a little less remarkable
LOL!
Not one of my personal top ten made any list. If I extended it to top 25, Spike, Kenshin, Shinji, and Nana might just make it. Over half of my top ten are female.
I guess I just don’t fit in.
None of mine made it either but then again, most anime bloggers watch way more anime than average. I think most of them come from shows people haven’t seen
If I had to guess (and I wouldn’t put money on it) this is the post you’re referring to:
/2018/09/29/do-you-like-characters-which-are-relatable-or-remarkable/
Thanks! I thought I had one with % but maybe I dreamt it. this one is good too
Brilliant! All anime writers had to do was focus on the names of the characters and they would instantly become popular! If only anime writers had found this key element sooner! What, Kenshin is a shojo?! really? (pondering, pondering, pondering) Really?!
Really! I know right!?!