2025 has been one of the most plentiful and high-quality years that the anime industry has ever seen. The Spring and Summer seasons alone have been bursting with excellent shows like The Summer Hikaru Died. Frankly, anime fans are spoiled for choice in 2025. There’s just so much great new anime that, even though we’re more than halfway through the year, it’s going to be next to impossible to choose an Anime of the Year. But given how we’re approaching the Fall season, let’s stop and think of which titles could be crowned the best anime of 2025.
For the purposes of this list, we’ll mostly be looking at new and original anime that debuted this year. While fan-favorite anime like Solo Leveling (2024), Dan Da Dan (2024), and The Apothecary Diaries (2023) are great and their second seasons may be excellent, this list intends to spotlight new anime, or at the very least, spin-offs of long-running franchises. We’re also going to limit it to six recommendations, which lines up with how many nominees Crunchyroll usually includes for Anime of the Year. Plus, if you want to check out any of these titles, most of them are easily available over on Crunchyroll, too!
The Summer Hikaru Died (2025)
If you ask me which show is most likely to be Anime of the Year, I would probably say it’s The Summer Hikaru Died. Never mind the fact that it’s an excellent fusion of horror and yaoi (aka Boys’ Love). What makes The Summer Hikaru Died so compelling is how it stays with you long after you finish watching it. Maybe it’s because of the creeping small-town horror or the will-they-won’t-they romance between Hikaru and Yoshiki, but the series exudes tension so effortlessly.
In a lesser year, there would be no debate as to whether or not The Summer Hikaru Died would be considered Anime of the Year, but 2025 is not like other years. Still, The Summer Hikaru Died should find a spot on everyone’s watch list, especially if you’re looking for a Netflix anime with a hint of Lovecraftian horror and tender LGBT themes.
Zenshu (2025)
In a season that was dominated by Solo Leveling’s second season, most Winter anime got lost in the shuffle. This is especially tragic in the case of Zenshu, a fantasy anime that’s inspired by classic fantasy adventure anime from the ’80s and ’90s. The sense of adventure Zenshu creates feels like a cross between Studio Ghibli’s Nausicaä of the Valley of the Wind (1984) and Shirobako (2014).
Zenshu is compelling to watch solely because of how it handles the numerous themes it wants to address. Sure, the animation is delightful, especially the magical girl-inspired transformation sequences, but the show’s heart lies in examining the art of storytelling. Authorial intent, the nature of endings, death, and predestination are all tackled in Zenshu in thought-provoking ways and come together to create one of the most satisfying climaxes of any anime I’ve seen so far in 2025. Zenshu is a series that’s not only perfect for those yearning for classic anime aesthetics, but for creators who love stories about stories.
Kowloon Generic Romance (2025)
Kowloon Generic Romance is a complicated series to dissect, and that’s entirely because it's adapting virtually an entire manga in a 13-episode series. The series focuses on a woman named Reiko in the Second Walled City of Kowloon, but it quickly becomes apparent that not everything in the city is what it seems, most notably with the revelation that another Reiko was living in Kowloon, but no one seems to recall who she was.
Kowloon Generic Romance stands apart from the crowd entirely due to how it’s intended for adults. The anime feels mature, complete with a multitude of mysteries and character drama addressed in artistic and poignant ways. At points, it feels somewhat overstuffed, with plenty of blink-and-you’ll-miss-it plot points, but when the series hits, it comes across like an anime version of Severance (2022). Kowloon Generic Romance will wrap you in its odd sense of nostalgia for bygone summer days and lost loves, and no other anime this year can come close to making that claim.
Uma Musume: Cinderella Gray (2025)
The Uma Musume series has been around for nearly a decade, and while it’s been a fairly popular series in Japan with numerous Gacha games and merchandise, it was never able to break through in the West in any meaningful way. That was until Uma Musume: Cinderella Gray, which tells the story of Oguri Cap, a horse girl who is trying to be the best competitive racer of them all.
Cinderella Gray is a sports story at its heart, filled with all of the drama and twists befitting one, and would feel right at home with other sports movies like Field of Dreams (1989) and A League of Their Own (1992), just with cute horse girls! This became Prime Video’s big anime of the Spring season (Sorry, GQuuuuuux!), and the fact that it was able to explode in popularity as much as it has goes to show just how much fun and emotionally satisfying the series is. If you’re trying to find a traditional, yet unconventional, anime sports series, then you’ll have a great time with Cinderella Gray.
To Be Hero X (2025)
China has been desperately trying to break into the anime scene for years, but after years of middling successes, it finally had its first unmitigated hit with To Be Hero X. The series is a superhero anthology show that runs for 24 episodes and focuses on the stories of the top 10 heroes in Japan and how they all intersect with each other. Sometimes the connections are pretty straightforward, but other times, the series channels Rashomon (1950) by presenting scenarios from multiple characters’ perspectives to enhance the larger narrative.
What sets To Be Hero X apart from other anime is how it mixes animation styles. The series frequently shifts between some absolutely gorgeous 2D animation and 3D CG, with a mixed media intro that’s one of the year’s best. Think of the show as a love child of the animation of Arcane (2021) crossed with the spectacle of My Hero Academia (2016). The biggest strength of To Be Hero X is its world, most notably how trust and fear determine not only a hero’s status in society, but also the nature of their powers. To Be Hero X is ambitious in a lot of ways, and so far, that ambition is paying off in spades.
Takopi’s Original Sin (2025)
Depression, thy name is Takopi’s Original Sin. Despite only lasting six episodes, each episode of Takopi’s Original Sin hits with the emotional weight of a freight train, layering on trauma after trauma for each member of its small cast. The show at first appears to be a happy-go-lucky children’s show about a magical octopus coming to Earth to make people smile, but after 15 minutes, it becomes all too clear that this isn’t like Doraemon (2005) at all.
It’s a tough watch, coming with a content warning at the beginning of each episode, but it’s so well-written and gorgeously animated that you just can’t turn away from it despite the soul-crushing nature of it all. The only other anime that’s arguably just as depressing as Takopi’s Original Sin is Grave of the Fireflies (1988), which is saying something. Despite the darkness, Takopi’s Original Sin is so artistically fulfilling that it’s hard not to consider it nothing short of a must-watch anime experience.
