What is the State of the Anime Industry?
What are the trends in the anime industry as of 2023?
My name is Peter Payne, and I’ve been blogging about Japan and anime since 1998, possibly longer than anyone. I’ve recently started publishing my posts here on Substack, and I’m looking forward to hearing your feedback!
The year is coming to a close. So, I thought it would be fun to look back over the past year and come up with some observations on the health of anime as a whole. Keep reading to learn what I think of the state of the anime industry in 2023!
Anime is more popular than ever — almost too popular for some of us — as funding from streaming platforms sprays money at anime studios for content to air. The anime industry overall generated US$32 billion in 2023, a number that’s expected to rise to $72 billion by 2032.
Foreign Investment Hasn’t Negatively Affected the Anime Industry Yet
Over the past decade, the number of foreign companies investing in the anime industry has positively exploded. In addition to the big streaming platforms like Netflix, Disney+ and Amazon Prime, major players like Universal, Tencent and Bilibili also bankroll anime series. This is usually done through the “anime production committee” system, which lets various companies bring capital and marketing expertise to projects and take out profits from the other side.
Ever since I first saw the famous Universal logo at the beginning of an anime series, I’ve fretted that foreign investment might cause the industry to get pulled in directions that weren’t good for fans or studios. Perhaps Hollywood’s penchant for endless sequels, prequels and reboots would cause them to try this approach with anime. Or that funding from streaming platforms or Chinese corporations might cause them to increase censorship to levels we fans couldn’t accept.
And while the huge swoon in the stock price of tech giants in 2022 caused some culling of bad streaming projects, I believe the anime industry hasn’t been affected much. The reason is that anime is super cheap to make, and Amazon or Disney+ are much happier paying $1 million for a 12-episode series than $25 million for a single episode of She Hulk: Attorney At Law.
Narou-kei Anime Might Be Getting Better
When I blog about an anime, I usually go out of my way to check whether the story is an original anime or was based on professional manga or novel sources. Or did it start out as a narou-kei web novel on the Let’s Become a Novelist website? Narou-kei anime can be incredible, and Konosuba, Re:Zero and Mushoku Tensei all started out as online fiction that got picked up for professional publishing. But it’s also true that every mediocre anime with an annoyingly long title like I Couldn’t Get a Job, so I Started Farming in Another World With My Smart Phone originates from online web novels.
2023 brought us several fresh and interesting anime that started out as Narou-kei stories. This includes My Happy Marriage, The Apothecary Diaries, and The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten, all of which I loved. Let’s hope for continued fresh story ideas from light novels in the new year!
Romance Anime is Taking Over the Anime Industry, and That’s a Good Thing
2023 brought us a ton of amazing romance anime. This delighted fans who got to experience love vicariously through the characters. We had fun love comedies (Tomo-chan is a Girl!), romantic historical dramas (My Happy Marriage), and office love story with a busty short-stack girl (My Tiny Senpai). We also got several enjoyable school romance offerings (The Dangers in My Heart, The Angel Next Door Spoils Me Rotten, Insomniacs After School, Horimiya: Pieces, and Yamada Lv999).
I wonder if, in the coming years, fans will be complaining that there are “too many” romance anime offerings coming out of studios. The way they complain about an overabundance of isekai or idol anime today. I wouldn’t mind that outcome.
Anime Fan Service is Still Going Strong in 2023
There wrere plenty of anime series offering strong visual fan service in the past year. We got everything from sexy pantyshots to bouncing boobs to the “angel cam” of MF Ghost. Fans worried that voices from conservative countries or prudes on the Internet creating outrage about the anime we love will cause fan service to go away have nothing to fear.
Even Sony isn’t shying away from showing sexy visuals in their anime. Sony-owned Aniplex brought us many sexy works in 2023, including Tomo-chan is a Girl!, Atelier Ryza, Nier:Automata, and even Ayakashi Triangle. While the company has earned the ire of fans for over-censoring anime games for the PlayStation platform (which is why we have so many awesome Nintendo Switch anime games in stock for you), they’re not applying this Puritanical approach to anime, at least.
Anime Salaries Might Be Headed Higher
Salaries in the anime industry are famously low. So low that Japanese lawmakers have held hearings into “black company” style working conditions. But the chronic lack of staff seems to finally be forcing companies to raise pay. According to the Japan Animators and Directors Association (JAniCA), the average salary for workers in 2023 was 4.55 million yen. That’s up 150,000 yen (~US$1000) from four years ago, which is something.
While any improvement is welcome, this is still just US$32,000 at the current exchange rate. That’s a ridiculously low sum for the creators who make the anime we all love to watch. Since this is the average amount, younger animators and staff working outside of Japan presumably get less. All while A-list seiyu take home $600,000+ a year thanks to royalties and money from live events.
No One Expected That Live-Action Anime Adaptions Would Ever Be Good
Another surprise of 2023 was that Netflix would actually learn how to make live-action anime adaptions fans don’t universally hate. After they did the impossible by making a mostly decent One Piece live-action version, the company followed it up with a surprisingly good adaption of Yu Yu Hakusho.
When I say “surprisingly good,” of course, I admit that the bar is quite low. That’s because of all the awful live-action adaptions that have come before. And no one reading this is likely the target audience of these kinds of shows. But if they bring in new fans, who might discover the original anime or manga works, that’s certainly a good thing.
The “Biodiversity” of Anime Is as High as Ever
Finally, it seems to me that the biodiversity of anime is really high in 2023. That can only be a good thing for the anime industry as a whole.
Do you want vanilla shows about men who get sent to isekai worlds where they have OP superpowers? There are several options for you each season. What about idol anime? Sure, take your pick! Or super-long shounen series with hundreds of episodes? Go crazy watching those!
I’m impressed by how often anime heads into totally new directions. We had lots of super-weird anime this year. Like Migi & Dali, a strange show about two identical twins who must pretend to be the same person. And a zombie anime that had plenty to say about how we should approach our lives. Also, an anime about a woman living with a depressed cat. And an anime about a boys’ singing choir. As long as awesome experimental anime like these are being produced for us each season, I think the anime industry will continue to shine.
Thanks for reading this blog post with my thoughts on the anime industry in 2023. Do you have any comments or concerns? Tell us in the comments below!
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