Read from Polygon:
To better understand just how vast anime culture has become, Polygon surveyed more than 4,000 Americans over the age of 18 about their anime consumption habits. Working with Vox Media’s Insights and Research team and market research group The Circus, our results show that not only is anime’s popularity growing significantly with each generation, but that — among younger audiences — it’s even surpassing cultural touchstones like the NFL.
While the anime audience skews young, as you might expect given how hard it was for boomers and Gen Xers to find their potential favorites at a young age, we wondered: How important is anime, generationally? So we asked all 4,275 participants how frequently they watch anime. The results show significant increases by generation. Just 3% of boomers watch anime weekly, whereas 42% of Gen Z participants do. That Gen Z number stands out not only because it shows anime’s ubiquity, but because of how it outpaces established juggernauts. For example, only 25% of Gen Z follows the NFL, according to YPulse. A few teams are even chasing the audience. See: the LA Chargers cutting One Piece-referencing promo videos and then-Detroit Lions running back Jamaal Williams showing off his Naruto love with absolute pride.
Looking into the audience, we found that anime fans as a group are more diverse than the broader U.S. population. Black Americans account for 17% of the anime fan audience over 18, compared to 13% of the general population, while Asian Americans account for 10% of the anime fan audience, compared to 6% of the general population. Those numbers go up when narrowing down to Gen Z, with 23% Black American fans compared to 14% of the general population, and 13% Asian American fans compared to 7% of the general population.
Almost two-thirds of the anime-watching Gen Z audience say they emotionally connect better with anime than they do with traditional media due to the types of storylines and characters present. Additionally, 44% of anime fans — and 58% of Gen Z fans — say they have had a crush on an anime character at some point. We found this highly relatable.
65% of anime viewers go so far as to say they find anime more emotionally compelling than other forms of media — such as live-action shows and movies — with 90% of them crediting anime’s character depth, 89% crediting the emotional intensity, 89% crediting the character relationships, 87% crediting the animation style, and 86% crediting the voice acting quality.
In many ways, anime is the new Friends, making a massive impact on modern audiences in everything from how they dress to how they interact with those around them. The 1990s had The Rachel; the 2020s have designer Pokémon collabs. More than half of Gen Z anime fans say it affects their habits across the board, with the highest marks coming in how they see their identity and social understanding. And just like with Friends, more than half of fans return to anime series they’ve seen to watch reruns as comfort food.
Closing things out, our team tallied up numbers on where Gen Z and millennial anime fans watch anime. Given Netflix’s massive subscriber base (almost 250 million as of late 2023) and extensive lineup, we weren’t surprised to see it on top, followed by mainstays Hulu and Prime Video. But specialist platforms such as Crunchyroll and Funimation also made strong showings, despite having a small fraction of Netflix’s overall user numbers.
To better understand just how vast anime culture has become, Polygon surveyed more than 4,000 Americans over the age of 18 about their anime consumption habits. Working with Vox Media’s Insights and Research team and market research group The Circus, our results show that not only is anime’s popularity growing significantly with each generation, but that — among younger audiences — it’s even surpassing cultural touchstones like the NFL.
While the anime audience skews young, as you might expect given how hard it was for boomers and Gen Xers to find their potential favorites at a young age, we wondered: How important is anime, generationally? So we asked all 4,275 participants how frequently they watch anime. The results show significant increases by generation. Just 3% of boomers watch anime weekly, whereas 42% of Gen Z participants do. That Gen Z number stands out not only because it shows anime’s ubiquity, but because of how it outpaces established juggernauts. For example, only 25% of Gen Z follows the NFL, according to YPulse. A few teams are even chasing the audience. See: the LA Chargers cutting One Piece-referencing promo videos and then-Detroit Lions running back Jamaal Williams showing off his Naruto love with absolute pride.
Looking into the audience, we found that anime fans as a group are more diverse than the broader U.S. population. Black Americans account for 17% of the anime fan audience over 18, compared to 13% of the general population, while Asian Americans account for 10% of the anime fan audience, compared to 6% of the general population. Those numbers go up when narrowing down to Gen Z, with 23% Black American fans compared to 14% of the general population, and 13% Asian American fans compared to 7% of the general population.
Almost two-thirds of the anime-watching Gen Z audience say they emotionally connect better with anime than they do with traditional media due to the types of storylines and characters present. Additionally, 44% of anime fans — and 58% of Gen Z fans — say they have had a crush on an anime character at some point. We found this highly relatable.
65% of anime viewers go so far as to say they find anime more emotionally compelling than other forms of media — such as live-action shows and movies — with 90% of them crediting anime’s character depth, 89% crediting the emotional intensity, 89% crediting the character relationships, 87% crediting the animation style, and 86% crediting the voice acting quality.
In many ways, anime is the new Friends, making a massive impact on modern audiences in everything from how they dress to how they interact with those around them. The 1990s had The Rachel; the 2020s have designer Pokémon collabs. More than half of Gen Z anime fans say it affects their habits across the board, with the highest marks coming in how they see their identity and social understanding. And just like with Friends, more than half of fans return to anime series they’ve seen to watch reruns as comfort food.
Closing things out, our team tallied up numbers on where Gen Z and millennial anime fans watch anime. Given Netflix’s massive subscriber base (almost 250 million as of late 2023) and extensive lineup, we weren’t surprised to see it on top, followed by mainstays Hulu and Prime Video. But specialist platforms such as Crunchyroll and Funimation also made strong showings, despite having a small fraction of Netflix’s overall user numbers.
