I published two articles reviewing the year that was in anime in 2024, with one article ranking what I thought were the best series and the other handing out category-specific awards. I watch most new anime on Crunchyroll, an anime streaming service owned by Sony. That usually works well enough, although I am a bit irritated by some obviously unacceptable subtitling in early episodes of Ave Mujica – The Die is Cast (a winter 2025 series that was the sequel to my fourth-ranked show of 2023). But I digress. I read a report on Anime News Network by Alex Mateo titled Crunchyroll Anime Awards Reveal 2025 Nominees. At first I did not plan to offer my take since I have already shared my opinion on the best anime of 2024. However, upon further review, I decided to tackle the Crunchyroll awards for three reasons:

  1. Crunchyroll’s nominees are set, meaning that they will challenge me to pick the best from a limited slate of nominated shows. This will also give me the opportunity to address some shows I did not feature in my own year-end review articles.
  2. I am sure the Crunchyroll awards are of some general interest, so I can tell people how they should vote (my opinions are your cheat sheet).
  3. I may find some category award ideas to use in my 2025 anime review articles at the end of the year.

According to Anime News Network, Crunchyroll votes are due by April 14, 2025, so I am posting this with enough time for readers to steal my obviously incorrect answers regarding Crunchyroll’s mostly incorrect nominees. Without further ado, I will make my picks for the winners of the Crunchyroll anime of the year awards. Below, I will work through each Crunchyroll award category in the order they are presented in the Anime News Network article.

(For people looking for my in-depth opinions or more practical what-to-try advice, I recommend starting with my real 2024 anime review.)

Anime of the Year

Crunchyroll nominated the following six shows for consideration for anime of the year:

I ranked my own six top anime of 2025. None of those shows are among Crunchyroll’s six nominees – so we are off to what I would consider a rough start. I watched four of the six shows, with the two exceptions being Delicious in Dungeon and Solo Leveling. I addressed DAN DA DAN, Frieren, and Kaiju No. 8 in the honorable mentions section of my ranking and noted that I did not much care for the first season of The Apothecary Diaries in a separate article.

By all rights, the winner here should have been either Frieren or Apothecary Diaries season one, both of which got off to strong starts (granting Frieren peaked in the middle of its run). But both of these shows lost me as they meandered down the home stretch. Thus, I will go with Kaiju No. 8, an action show with a good heart that did lose some steam in the home stretch but not as badly as Frieren (which concluded with a 10 episode waving the whole affair away as pointless) or Apothecary Diaries season one (which became boring).

(Aside: The ongoing second season of The Apothecary Diaries, which began in January 2025, has been strong and barring a second-half collapse, it is well on pace to the best series of the six nominees.)

Scene from Kaiju No. 8 anime where Kikoru Shinomiya lifts a truck with one hand while Kafka Hibino and Reno Ichikawa look on in shock.
Scene from Kaiju No. 8. Kikoru Shimomiya effortlessly lifts Kafka Hibino’s (right) truck as aKafka and Reno Ichikawa look on in shock.

Winner: Kaiju No. 8

Film of the Year

I am going to have to take a pass on this award because I did not watch any anime movies in 2025. But I present the list for those who have:

I recall having seen things about Look Back and The Colors Within, so perhaps I will catch up with them in 2025 and report back.

Winner: NONE, I am a TV ANIME specialist (but do read my take on Five Centimeters Per Second)

Best Original Anime

“Original anime” refers to shows that are not based on underlying source material (e.g., books, manga, or games). I present the six nominees:

In my own anime category awards article, I gave the nod to Girls Band Cry, which was also my choice for the sixth best anime of 2024. Thus, it should come as no surprise that my choice here is Girls Band Cry. The rest of the list is brutal. I watched at least part of every nominee except Ninja Kamui. I somehow did watch BUCCHIGIRI?! and Metalic Rouge from beginning to end, and they were probably the two worst anime I made it through in 2024. But “making it through” is more than I can say about Train to the End of the World, which I dropped after three episodes. I covered Jellyfish Can’t Swim in the Night in a full hair color article. While I enjoyed the anime’s detailed treatment of hair color, the show’s promising start devolved into a mess and its conclusion made the waste that was Frieren’s final arc look like a masterpiece.

Scene from Girls Band Cry anime. Momokoa sits in a couch on the foreground smiling while playing the guitar. Nina and Subaru look irritated while sitting on a couch in the background watching Momoka.
Screen capture from Girls Band Cry.

Winner: Girls Band Cry

Best Continuing Series

This award seems to be for anime having second (or beyond) seasons in 2024. The nominees are:

Three of my top-four anime of 2024 were in their second or third seasons. One of those, my fourth-place finisher Oshi no Ko season 2, appears among Crunchyroll’s nominees. While it was only my third-favorite continuing series in a vacuum, it runs away with the title here – not least because I did not watch any of the other nominees (anything with “training arc” in the title sounds horrifying to me). I have probably not seen an episode of Bleach in 15-16 years. I watched most of the first season of SpyxFamily but eventually became bored enough that I did not finish, much less watch the second (noted in my 2022 anime review).

Kana Arima in a comic-book-style scene feigning shock with stars in her eyes as she reads from a piece of paper.
Kana Arima in a comedic scene in Oshi no Ko 2.

Winner: Oshi no Ko Season 2

Best New Series

This award appears to be for shows which debuted in 2024:

  • DAN DA DAN
  • Delicious in Dungeon
  • Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Kaiju No. 8
  • Solo Leveling
  • The Apothecary Diaries

The best new series nominess are identical to the anime of the year nominees. Unsurprisingly, I can incorporate by reference my thoughts and ultimate selection from the anime of the year section.

Winner: Kaiju No. 8

Best Opening Sequence

This one is self-explanatory:

I have a rule that I only rate opening and ending sequences for shows I watched since I think they have to be evaluated in the context of the show. In this case, we are left with Kaiju No. 8, Oshi no Ko 2 and DANDADAN. I do not particularly care for any of them – even granting that DANDADAN’s and Kaiju No. 8’s were very stylish (the problem is that neither is aesthetic). If you force me to choose…

Winner: “Fatal” – GEMN – Oshi no Ko Season 2

Best Ending Sequence

Now for the best endings:

I am genuinely flabbergasted that none of the three ending sequences from Makeine: Too Many Losing Heroines!, two of which went 1-2 on my own ranking for best opening/ending sequences of 2024, are among the nominees. What is going on here? In this case, I can consider The Elusive Samurai’s ending since I made it through six or seven episodes of that unpleasant show before dropping it. Similarly to DAN DA DAN, the ending sequence is very stylish. Also similarly to DAN DA DAN, it is unaesthetic. I will confess that I did not immediately remember Kaiju No. 8’s ending sequence, so I watched it anew. It is decent with some fun computer animation (I should look into what the computer’s operating system is inspired by). But is Kaiju No. 8’s ending good enough to win? It is not. While I did not include Oshi no Ko’s ending on my best joint opening/ending list, it was good and a terrific fit with one of the best anime of 2024, so I do not feel bad about it being my choice here.

Screen capture from ending song for Oshi no Ko season 2 showing Ruby Hoshino in a red dress dancing against a red background.
Screen capture from Oshi no Ko’s second ending showing Ruby Hoshino dancing.

Winner: “Burning” – hitsujibungaku – Oshi no Ko Season 2

Best Action

I am unsure whether “best action” is for the “best action anime” or “the anime with the best action.” For reasons I explained in my awards post, I prefer the latter interpretation since these sorts of categories end up otherwise having too much overlap with anime of the year and other broader categories. The nominees:

  • Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War Part 3 – The Conflict
  • DAN DA DAN
  • Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Hashira Training Arc
  • Kaiju No. 8
  • Solo Leveling
  • Wind Breaker

I am surprised Shangri-La Frontier, the show I gave the best animation nod to for its action, is missing. I could make a case for DAN DA DAN, Kaiju No. 8, and Wind Breaker for pure action. Wind Breaker – a throwback delinquent (albeit good delinquents here) show had the best animation and choreography of the nominees and DAN DA DAN had the most stylish single episode, but Kaiju No. 8 had good enough action and was the best of the three contenders.

Kafka Hibino in kaiju form in Kaiju No. 8 winding up to throw a punch while glowing blue with electricity.
Action shot from Kaiju No. 8.

Winner: Kaiju No. 8

Best Isekai Anime

I warn readers that I think best isekai anime is often (but not always) a contradiction in terms. (See definition of isekai.) But fine, let us do this. Show the nominees:

April 12, 2025 Update note

I added a link to the definition of isekai and a link to one article wherein I wrote about what I consider to be a great isekai. I also qualified my take about SLF not being an isekai.

I only watched two of these. Despite only watching two, I am sad to report that we have a default winner. Shangri-La Frontier is not an isekai anime (in my humble opinion, at least). It is an anime about 3D people in the real world playing a virtual reality game. They are neither transported to nor stuck in the game. They can leave whenever they want! Thus, Re:ZERO season 3 wins by default. Season 3 is decent enough but I think Re:ZERO hopped over a shark somewhere in season 2. I did not watch the other four shows – but I will have readers know that I suffered through the first season and a quarter of That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime years ago based on a recommendation. (Aside: SLF vs Re:ZERO would be a coin flip choice, so disqualifying the former prevented me from needing to spend too much time thinking about it.)

Winner: Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- Season 3

Best Drama

I will interpret the best drama category as the anime with the best dramatic elements rather than the best anime that can be classified as a drama. Roll the nominees:

I watched every nominee save for Pluto. I know I said earlier in the article that BUCCHIGIRI?! and Metallic Rouge were the worst shows I watched from beginning to end in 2024, but seeing DEAD DEAD DEMONS DEDEDEDE DESTRUCTION, which was equal parts pretentious and unpleasant, at least gives them a run for their money despite being an objectively higher quality production. Some of the drama nominees were not too dramatic. A Sign of Affection, which finished fifth on my best anime of 2024 list, is a fairly low-stakes romance, and much of the drama is resolved in the show’s first half. The drama in The Apothecary Diaries is largely the protagonist solving mysteries through monologues. There is no real drama in Frieren because every problem is solved by Frieren and Fern being hilariously over-powered. Oshi no Ko season 2 has some genuine drama and uncertainty (from the perspective of an anime-only viewer), so let us add to its award haul.

Melt Narushima with purple hair and white robes looks intense while wielding a sword in a play in Oshi no Ko 2.
Capture from an in-show performance in Oshi no Ko 2.

Winner: Oshi no Ko Season 2

Best Romance

Which anime had the best romantic elements? Let us see the nominees:

I only watched three of six – although I plan to get around to watching Blue Box (which continued into winter 2025) eventually. A Sign of Affection (discussed above, also see my full review) was a high-level anime romance, but not enough to create drama here. The Dangers in My Heart 2 was my pick for 2024 anime of the year and best romance on my own category awards.

Anna and Kyotaro share a dessert on a bench at night in The Dangers in My Heart season 2.
A romantic moment in the second season of The Dangers in My Heart.

Winner: The Dangers in My Heart Season 2

Best Slice of Life

I did not hand out a slice of life award because I think the term is too hard to define. But Crunchyroll does, so I will announce my pick here.

Once again, I watched three of six, with my second runner-up for anime of the year, Sound! Euphonium 3, making its first appearance on the Crunchyroll nominees list. I had watched the first two seasons of Laid Back Camp (season two won my award for best opening/ending song in 2021), but I passed on the third because I was bored by the end of the second (the second-tier main characters did it in). Both The Dangers in My Heart and Sound! Euphonium were anime of the year-caliber shows, but only one actually won my anime of the year award, and I cannot say one was more slice of life than the other.

Moeko Sekine in a white coat drags Kyotaro Ichikawa by his collar down the sidewalk.
This screenshot from The Dangers in My Heart 2 proves that slice of life can drag you along.

Winner: The Dangers in My Heart Season 2

Best Animation

I interpret the best animation award as pertaining to movement and choreography more than aesthetics. For the nominees:

  • DAN DA DAN
  • Delicious in Dungeon
  • Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Hashira Training Arc
  • Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Kaiju No. 8
  • Solo Leveling

My own pick was Shangri-La Frontier, but with that (surprisingly) not among the nominees, I turn to my runner-up: Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End. While Frieren is not the most action-packed show, no show in 2024 hit the highs Frieren did in some of its better animated moments (episodes 8 and 9 are all-timers in this area).

Fern walking dramatically while holding a staff and having a red splotch of blood on her white dress on her shoulder.
Fern in the best action episode of Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End.

Winner: Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Best Background Art

This award seems to explain itself. The nominees:

  • DAN DA DAN
  • Delicious in Dungeon
  • Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Hashira Training Arc
  • Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Pluto
  • The Apothecary Diaries

I did not give out a background art award. While I described Sound! Euphonium 3 as being the prettiest TV anime I have seen in any year (much less 2024), I would have given the background art award to Frieren, which is a proverbial collection of desktop backgrounds in anime form.

Frieren and Fern read a Grimorie in Frireren Beyond Journey's End as a beam of sunlight shines on them through an opening in a rock wall.
Frieren (left) and Fern (right) in an early episode of Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End.

Winner: Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Best Character Design

Another easy-to-understand award. The nominees:

  • DAN DA DAN
  • Delicious in Dungeon
  • Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Hashira Training Arc
  • Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Kaiju No. 8
  • The Apothecary Diaries

I gave this award to Sound! Euphonium in my article. I am not too impressed with the selection here. Frieren’s character designs err on the ugly-cute side, but with too much ugly (that is my impression of Delicious in Dungeon as well, but I did not watch that one). DAN DA DAN is not my cup of tea. The Apothecary Diaries has solid character designs, but using hair color to distinguish important characters (see my article) is not a great fit for the setting. It is nevertheless a close call between Apothecary and Kaiju, and I will give the nod to the historical fantasy.

A pensive Mamomao stands at the center of more enthusiastic servants in episode 1 of The Apothecary Diaries.
I will leave it to readers to identify the protagonist of The Apothecary Diaries.

Winner: The Apothecary Diaries

Best Director

I base my best director award on what I perceive the director did with what he or she had to work with more than what was the best show. Let us see the nominees…

  • Fūga Yamashiro – DAN DA DAN
  • Haruo Sotozaki – Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Hashira Training Arc
  • Keiichirō Saitō – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Megumi Ishitani – One Piece Fan Letter
  • Norihiro Naganuma – The Apothecary Diaries
  • Yoshihiro Miyajima – Delicious in Dungeon

I only saw three of six and none of them struck me as great director efforts. I will discard DAN DA DAN off the bat, leaving us with Frieren and Apothecary. I am nonplussed about this choice, but granting my issues with both of their scripts and second halves, I will give the nod to the more impressive animated production.

Winner: Keiichirō Saitō – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Best Main Character

I distinguish between 2D boys and girls in my best character ranking, but Crunchyroll lumps everyone together.

  • Frieren – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Kafka Hibino – Kaiju No. 8
  • Okarun – DAN DA DAN
  • Maomao – The Apothecary Diaries
  • Momo – DAN DA DAN
  • Sung Jinwoo – Solo Leveling

I only have to discard Sung Jinwoo for having avoided watching Solo Leveling. While I did not particularly like DAN DA DAN, Momo was the show’s only likable character (Okarun was… not), but not enough for a best character list. Freiren, Kafka, and Maomao were all solid. My choice comes down to the latter two. Kafka ranked fifth on my list of best male characters of 2024, while neither Frieren nor Maomao made my lists. Even so, I will give the narrow nod to Maomao, for she is a charismatic lead and the flaws in the first season of Apothecary Diaries were more the fault of those around her.

Winner: Maomao – The Apothecary Diaries

Best Supporting Character

I did not do a best supporting character award, although I handed out best supporting actor and actress, which could be viewed as something of a proxy. For Crunchyroll’s nominees:

  • Fern – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Himmel – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Jinshi – The Apothecary Diaries
  • Seiko – DAN DA DAN
  • Senshi – Delicious in Dungeon
  • Turbo Granny – DAN DA DAN

Having noted above that every DAN DA DAN character except Momo was annoying, we can cast aside its two nominees here. Fern from Frieren should be in the main character category, but even granting she had too big of a role for supporting character, she would not be my pick here. This comes down to Jinshi, who could also be fairly classified as main (I included his voice actor in my best actor instead of supporting actor category) but designating him as supporting is acceptable given how Maomao-centric The Apothecary Diaries is, and Himmel, who is dead for most of Frieren. I will give the dead guy the nod because the late Himmel’s influence on Frieren is probably the show’s most interesting point.

Winner: Himmel – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

“Must Protect At All Costs” Character

I see we are reaching social media meme awards. The candidates:

  • Anya Forger – Spy×Family Season 2
  • Frieren – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Okarun- DAN DA DAN
  • Senshi – Delicious in Dungeon
  • Tokiyuki Hojo – The Elusive Samurai
  • Yuki Itose – A Sign of Affection

I have no idea what to do with this award but I will give it my best shot.

I will note that part of why I soured on SpyxFamily season 2 was because Anya was “please love me and post internet memes of me” distilled in a character. Manipulation in character-form puts too much pressure on the viewer (not nice!). I do not know why Frieren is here – she is absurdly strong. She can protect herself (and me). Okarun is annoying so I would not go out of my way to protect him. The Elusive Samurai is a terrible show so I would prefer to purge it and Tokiyuki from my memory. There is only one choice here. Yuki is sweet – she works hard to grow, become self-sufficient, and help others, but she can certainly use support, especially with the little things that are challenges when you are deaf.

Yuki riding a train as seen from the outside through a glass window in episode 12 of the A Sign of Affection anime adaptation.
Yuki in A Sign of Affection.

Winner: Yuki Itose – A Sign of Affection

Best Anime Song

I decided not to award this in 2024 since it ends up having too much overlap with the opening/ending sequence honors and it is too much effort to keep track of in-show songs. But Crunchyroll handles things differently, so let us see the nominees.

  • “Abyss” – YUNGBLUD – Kaiju No. 8
  • “Bling-Bang-Bang-Born” – Creepy Nuts – MASHLE: MAGIC AND MUSCLES The Divine Visionary Candidate Exam Arc
  • “Fatal” – GEMN – Oshi no Ko Season 2
  • “LEveL” – SawanoHiroyuki[nZk]: TOMORROW X TOGETHER – Solo Leveling
  • “Otonoke” – Creepy Nuts – DAN DA DAN
  • “The Brave” – YOASOBI – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End

Per my rules, I can only consider Kaiju No. 8, Oshi no Ko, DAN DA DAN, and Frieren. The nominees are similar here to the best opening nominees. I gave Oshi no Ko the nod over Kaiju No. 8 the first time, but it was close enough that I will even things out here.

Winner: “Abyss” – YUNGBLUD – Kaiju No. 8

Best Score

Otherwise known as the best soundtrack. Crunchyroll’s nominees:

  • Bleach: Thousand-Year Blood War Part 3 – The Conflict – The Conflict- Shiro Sagisu
  • DAN DA DAN – kensuke ushio
  • Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Hashira Training Arc – Yuki Kajiura, Gō Shiina
  • Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – Evan Call
  • Look Back – haruka nakamura
  • Solo Leveling – Hiroyuki Sawano

Sound! Euphonium and Girls Band Cry are the obvious choices here. But with those not being options, I will give the nod to Frieren over DAN DA DAN.

Winner: Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End – Evan Call

Best Voice Artist Performance – Japanese

Crunchyroll has best voice actor/actress awards for many languages. But I only watched anime with Japanese audio in 2024, so this will be the final award I make a pick for.

  • Aoi Yūki (Maomao) – The Apothecary Diaries
  • Atsumi Tanezaki (Frieren) – Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • Kenichi Suzumura (Bravern) – Brave Bang Bravern!
  • Shion Wakayama (Momo) – DAN DA DAN
  • Sayaka Sembongi (Marcille) – Delicious in Dungeon
  • Natsuki Hanae (Okarun) – DAN DA DAN

I can consider five of six – excluding only Delicious in Dungeon. I gave Aoi Yūki the fourth place nod on my best actress list for her performance as Maomao, meaning we can rule on Atsumi Tanezaki as Frieren (I did consider her for my best actress list) and Shion Wakayama as Momo (solid but too much yelling). While I appreciate how much Natsuki Hanae was able to yell as Okarun, that will not be the choice. I am very tempted to go with Kenichi Suzumura as Bravern, who was perfect as a giant anime robot. But I will go with my head over my heart.

Jinshi looks on as Maomao bows toward Gyokuyō in episode 1 of The Apothecary Diaries.
Maomao, with her back facing us.

Winner: Aoi Yūki (Maomao) – The Apothecary Diaries

Conclusion

That wraps up all the awards I can choose for Crunchyroll. Very few lined up with my own anime of the year awards since I was not a big fan of most of the heavy hitters on Crunchyroll’s list of nominees. Just for fun, let us see the big Crunchyroll winners from my selections:

  • 5 Awards: Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End
  • 4 Awards: Kaiju No. 8; Oshi no Ko Season 2
  • 3 Awards: The Apothecary Diaries
  • 2 Awards: The Dangers in My Heart Season 2
  • 1 Award: A Sign of Affection; Girls Band Cry; Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- Season 3

This list looks very different than my own because Crunchyroll’s nominees limited my choices. Numbers aside, some awards are more valuable than others – namely Kaiju No. 8 being my pick from the choices provided for best overall series (despite the fact it missed my own top-six) and my own anime of the year, The Dangers in My Heart, going two-for-two when Crunchyroll made it an option. In the end, I suppose this list provides a picture of how I evaluate the popular (according to the Crunchyroll consensus) anime of 2024, but I recommend reading my 2024 anime ranking and category awards articles for a better picture of my take on the year that was in anime.

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