A new fan poll held in the lead-up to the anime convention AnimeJapan 2026 has revealed which manga fans most want to see adapted into anime. The annual “Manga We Want to See Animated Ranking” collected a record-breaking 222,758 votes this year (an increase of nearly 70,000 over last year) with fans choosing from a shortlist of 48 nominated titles.
The poll, now in its ninth year, is pretty influential, with past winners like The Dangers in My Heart, Solo Leveling, Komi Can’t Communicate, and The Apothecary Diaries all receiving successful anime adaptations following their placement on this list. Once a title wins first place, it is traditionally inducted into the “Hall of Fame” and excluded from future polls to make room for new contenders.
Taking the top spot this year is the romantic comedy “The Mortifying Ordeal of Being Seen” (Tonari no Seki no Yatsu ga Souiu Me de Mitekuru), written and illustrated by mmk. The story is about two seatmates who “look at each other with ulterior motives” and start an all-out “battle of flirtatious gazes.”
Trailing closely behing the rom-com are the baseball-themed Strikeout Pitch in second and the action-comedy Ketsu Battler in third. The rest of the top 10 features a mix of comedy, slice-of-life, and action titles. Utsuranain desu ranked fourth, while #Gal × Gal Yuri came in fifth, and On and Off: Work-Life Imbalance placed sixth. Further down the list, Usotsuki! Gokuoh-kun ranked seventh, followed by Dhinosann in eighth place. Then, the action manga Gokurakugai placed ninth, and Centuria rounded out the list in tenth place.
Usotsuki! Gokuoh-kun seems to be a rare “legacy” win. The manga actually ended its serialization years ago, but likely had a resurgence in popularity thanks to the publisher, Shogakukan, releasing a “complete edition” in mid-to-late 2025. Also of note is Centuria, a brutal, dark fantasy series from Shonen Jump+ that has been called the spiritual successor to Berserk. Its author, Tohru Kuramori, was a former assistant to Tatsuki Fujimoto of Chainsaw Man fame.
There’s also Gokurakugai, which, beyond its visual appeal, stands out due to its immense commercial success, having surpassed 1.4 million copies in circulation by early 2026 with only six volumes released so far. It also earned a public endorsement from the veteran mangaka Kei Urana (Gachiakuta), who praised the “flawless artwork” and said she has “collected every volume.”
