The Best Shonen Anime of All Time, Ranked

The big one. Shonen isn't a genre — it's the demographic that built anime as we know it, from playground arguments to sold-out movie premieres. So we settled it the only fair way: community scores from our catalog, one entry per franchise, each franchise represented by its single highest-rated season or film. The results have some surprises — starting immediately at #1.

1. Frieren: Beyond Journey's End

Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

TV · 2023 · ★ 9.1

Yes, it counts — and yes, it's #1.

Before the purists riot: Frieren runs in Weekly Shonen Sunday, making it exactly as shonen as Detective Conan and InuYasha. An elf mage outlives the hero's party she saved the world with, then retraces their journey to understand the humans she never made time to know. The highest-rated shonen in our catalog isn't a battle — it's a quiet masterpiece about time, grief, and second chances.

2. Gintama

Gintama: THE VERY FINAL

MOVIE · 2021 · ★ 9.1

The comedy that could out-drama anyone.

Aliens conquered feudal Japan, swords are banned, and freelancer Gintoki Sakata will do any odd job that pays for his sugar addiction. Gintama spends 300 episodes lovingly demolishing every shonen trope — then, whenever it feels like it, delivers arcs so good they embarrass the shows it parodies. THE VERY FINAL, its closing film, is the franchise at its peak.

3. Attack on Titan

Attack on Titan Season 3 Part 2

TV · 2019 · ★ 9.0

Season 3 Part 2 is as good as anime gets.

Humanity lives behind walls; man-eating giants live outside them; Eren Jaeger wants them all dead. What begins as survival horror mutates, season by season, into a war epic about freedom, cycles of hatred, and what people become when the walls come down. Its Season 3 Part 2 stretch — the battle for Shiganshina — is the franchise face here for a reason.

4. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood

TV · 2009 · ★ 9.0

The most complete story shonen has ever told.

Brothers Edward and Alphonse Elric broke alchemy's one taboo trying to resurrect their mother — and paid in flesh. Their hunt for the Philosopher's Stone unravels a nationwide conspiracy in a story with no wasted episodes, no weak arcs, and an ending so satisfying it's been the genre's gold standard for fifteen years.

5. Chainsaw Man

Chainsaw Man – The Movie: Reze Arc

MOVIE · 2025 · ★ 9.0

The new generation's crown jewel — chainsaws first.

Denji was a broke teenager hunting devils to pay his father's debts; now the Chainsaw Devil's heart beats in his chest and public safety work is a meat grinder. The Reze Arc movie — where Denji meets a girl who's almost too good to be true — is the franchise's highest-rated entry and modern shonen at maximum voltage.

6. Hunter x Hunter (2011)

Hunter x Hunter (2011)

TV · 2011 · ★ 8.9

The smartest battle system ever written.

Gon Freecss takes the deadly Hunter Exam to find the father who abandoned him, and drags us through the best power system (Nen), the best tournament arcs, and — in Chimera Ant — one of the darkest, most philosophical stretches in shonen history. Togashi's masterpiece rewrites its own rules constantly and never cheats.

7. BLEACH: Thousand-Year Blood War

BLEACH: Thousand-Year Blood War

TV · 2022 · ★ 8.8

The comeback that redeemed a legacy.

Substitute Soul Reaper Ichigo Kurosaki faces the war his story was always building toward: the Quincy invasion of Soul Society. A decade after the original series ended unfinished, TYBW returned with film-grade production and turned the manga's most divisive arc into its victory lap — currently concluding with The Calamity.

8. ONE PIECE

ONE PIECE

TV · 1999 · ★ 8.7

A quarter century of momentum, still accelerating.

Monkey D. Luffy — rubber body, straw hat, zero doubt — sails to find the One Piece and become King of the Pirates. Over 1,100 episodes, One Piece has built the largest, most emotionally interconnected world in shonen, where a flashback from episode 300 detonates in episode 1,000. There is no catching up. Start anyway.

9. Mob Psycho 100

Mob Psycho 100 II

TV · 2019 · ★ 8.7

The most powerful psychic alive just wants to be normal.

Shigeo “Mob” Kageyama could level a city with a thought, so he decided feelings shouldn't be solved that way — and gave the reins to his con-artist mentor Reigen, the best character in modern anime. Season II turns ONE's scribbly gag premise into a genuinely moving story about growing up, animated like a fireworks factory on fire.

10. My Hero Academia

My Hero Academia FINAL SEASON

TV · 2025 · ★ 8.7

The final season sticks the landing.

In a world where 80% of people have powers, quirkless Izuku Midoriya inherits the strongest one from his idol and enrolls at hero school. MHA carried the Jump banner for a decade — and its FINAL SEASON, the franchise's highest-rated entry, is the payoff for every torch-passing moment along the way.

Just missed the cut

The 8.5+ club runs deep: HAIKYU!! (the best sports anime ever made — fight us), Hajime no Ippo (boxing's answer to it), JUJUTSU KAISEN (Season 2's Shibuya arc is an all-timer), and Demon Slayer, whose Entertainment District arc turned every episode finale into a global event.

HAIKYU!! 3rd Season

TV · 2016 · ★ 8.7

HAIKYU!! 3rd Season — ★8.7 and five straight episodes of the best volleyball match ever animated.