The anime site was HiAnime.to. The Office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) included it in the 2024 Review of Notorious Markets for Counterfeiting and Piracy, alongside online and physical markets that rightsholders reported as being involved in substantial piracy. HiAnime had previously been associated with the names Zoro.to and Aniwatch.to.
There is an important date and terminology correction: USTR released the 2024 review on January 8, 2025. It was not an ordinary “streaming list,” and its publication was not a court judgment, automatic blocking order, or direct shutdown command. The report brought substantial reported traffic and the site’s rebrand history into the U.S. government’s enforcement and policy spotlight.
The short answer
USTR’s 2024 Notorious Markets List identified HiAnime.to as a reported online piracy market offering unauthorized movies and television content, particularly anime. The report described HiAnime as a successor or rebrand associated with Zoro.to and Aniwatch.to, while using qualified language that does not prove every stage of the operation had the same owners.
The strongest traffic figure came from the Motion Picture Association’s October 2, 2024 submission to USTR. Citing SimilarWeb estimates, the MPA reported that HiAnime received 209.5 million visits from 23.36 million unique visitors in August 2024 and had a global SimilarWeb rank of 194. USTR summarized that figure as more than 200 million visits.
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HiAnime later appeared to shut down in March 2026, with USTR subsequently describing the site and related mirrors as shut down in April. A later Vietnamese investigation was reportedly connected to the network, but the official Vietnamese written announcement did not name HiAnime directly. Nothing in the available record establishes that USTR’s 2024 listing alone caused the closure.
What USTR actually published
The official name is the Notorious Markets List (NML), not a streaming list. USTR’s annual review covers both online and physical markets reportedly involved in or facilitating substantial copyright piracy or trademark counterfeiting. The 2024 edition identified 38 online markets and 33 physical markets.
USTR says the list is intended to encourage governments, rightsholders, and private-sector intermediaries to prioritize action against prominent markets. It is also designed to identify the operators, infrastructure, and commercial relationships that allow large-scale infringement to continue. The agency’s announcement makes clear that inclusion does not itself constitute a legal finding of infringement.
In practical terms, a listing is:
- a U.S. government policy and public-awareness designation;
- an indication that USTR considered a market a prominent reported example of commercial-scale piracy or counterfeiting; and
- a way to focus diplomatic pressure, rightsholder complaints, and attention from service providers and enforcement agencies.
It is not:
- a criminal conviction;
- a court judgment against the site or its operators;
- an arrest warrant;
- an automatic order blocking HiAnime in the United States; or
- proof that every item on a service, or every person who used it, violated a particular law.
The list is not exhaustive either. A site can be absent without being lawful, and appearing on the list does not by itself resolve questions about ownership, jurisdiction, or the precise conduct of individual operators.
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How large was HiAnime?
HiAnime’s significance came partly from its enormous estimated audience. The MPA’s October 2, 2024 submission to USTR reported the following for August 2024:
| Measure | Reported figure | What it means |
|---|---|---|
| Visits | 209.5 million | Estimated visits during one month, not the number of individual viewers |
| Unique visitors | 23.36 million | Estimated distinct visitors during the cited period |
| Global SimilarWeb rank | 194 | The site’s estimated worldwide rank for the period cited by the MPA |
Those numbers should not be read as audited operator analytics. The MPA filing explains that SimilarWeb combines third-party data, panels, public sources, and modeling or extrapolation. A “visit” is also not the same thing as a unique person or a completed viewing session. The figures describe one month, rather than a confirmed annual audience.
That is why descriptions of HiAnime as the “world’s biggest anime piracy site” need a qualifier. It was widely described that way on the basis of traffic estimates; “biggest” could mean monthly visits, unique users, anime-only traffic, geographic reach, catalog size, or another metric. It was not an official U.S. government superlative.
The MPA submission also highlighted AnimeFLV.net as another major anime-focused piracy site and asked USTR to consider more than front-end websites. Its recommendations included infrastructure and commercial intermediaries such as hosting providers, reverse proxies, content delivery networks, domain registries, cyberlockers, advertising networks, and piracy-as-a-service providers. That broader focus helps explain why replacing a domain does not necessarily eliminate an operation.
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The three names are often compressed into the phrase “Zoro became Aniwatch became HiAnime.” That is a useful description of the public-facing brand sequence, but it should not be treated as a conclusive ownership finding.
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USTR’s reports use terms such as “successor,” “rebrand,” and “apparently.” The public record supports the following chronology:
| Date | Event |
|---|---|
| July 2023 | According to USTR’s account, rightsholders and anti-piracy groups shut down or took control of the Zoro.to domain. The operation was reportedly associated with Vietnam. |
| July 2023 | The site apparently re-emerged or continued under the Aniwatch.to brand. |
| January 30, 2024 | USTR released its 2023 review, which listed Aniwatch. This was not yet the HiAnime listing. |
| March 1, 2024 | Aniwatch rebranded as HiAnime, with the old domain redirecting users to the new one. |
| August 16, 2024 | USTR opened the public-comment process for its 2024 review through a Federal Register notice. |
| October 2, 2024 | The MPA submitted its recommendations for the 2024 review, including HiAnime. |
| January 8, 2025 | USTR published the final 2024 review, which included HiAnime. |
The distinction between the two USTR reports matters. The January 30, 2024 announcement concerned the 2023 review and listed Aniwatch. HiAnime appeared in the final 2024 review released nearly a year later, in January 2025. Reports that say HiAnime was included in the January 2024 government list are collapsing two separate events.
Why did the site keep changing names?
The confirmed fact is the sequence of brand changes. The reason for the March 2024 rebrand was not publicly explained by the operators.
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1Repair Windows errors before they cause bigger problems2Scan for outdated or missing drivers - takes under a minute3Clear out junk files and repair common Windows errorsContemporaneous reporting suggested that an Indian “dynamic+” blocking order naming Aniwatch may have contributed to the timing, but that remains a possible factor rather than an established explanation. A rebrand can also help an operation move users away from a pressured domain while preserving audience recognition, watchlists, search visibility, advertising relationships, or parts of its technical infrastructure.
Domain enforcement has a built-in limitation: taking down or blocking one web address does not necessarily identify the people behind the service or remove the servers, databases, payment channels, advertising relationships, and other providers supporting it. A replacement domain can redirect existing users, while mirrors and clones can keep the brand alive.
USTR’s description of Zoro, Aniwatch, and HiAnime reflects that problem. It identifies a reported successor or rebrand chain, but it does not establish that exactly the same legal entity or ownership group controlled every version. The possibilities include a continuing operation, a successor team, an acquired service, a copied database or interface, or some combination of those scenarios.
Why infrastructure matters more than a single domain
The HiAnime case illustrates the “hydra” effect of online piracy enforcement: removing one visible head can lead to replacement domains, mirrors, clones, unofficial apps, or new front ends connected to the same or related backend services.
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The MPA’s submission therefore looked beyond the site visitors saw. It discussed the ecosystem that can make a large unauthorized service resilient:
- Domains and registrars: replacement web addresses can be registered when an old address is blocked or lost.
- Reverse proxies and CDNs: these can sit between visitors and an origin server. The MPA reported that Cloudflare’s reverse-proxy service obscured HiAnime’s hosting location; that fact alone does not establish wrongdoing by the provider.
- Hosting and storage: a new front-end domain may still draw on the same servers, content databases, or delivery systems.
- Advertising and monetization: high traffic can support advertising relationships and other revenue channels.
- Cyberlockers and piracy-as-a-service providers: third-party services can supply files, streams, search functions, or technical tools to multiple sites.
This is why rightsholders and governments often seek action against operators and enabling infrastructure, rather than treating a domain seizure as the end of the story. It also explains why the disappearance of a recognizable brand does not automatically prove that every related mirror has disappeared.
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Did the USTR listing shut HiAnime down?
There is no evidence that the 2024 listing by itself caused HiAnime to close. The listing increased visibility and likely added to scrutiny, but the available sources do not establish a direct causal chain from the January 2025 report to the site’s later disappearance.
The subsequent record is more complicated:
- USTR’s later 2025 Notorious Markets List continued to identify HiAnime and cited an estimated 244 million visits in August 2025, showing that the brand remained significant after its inclusion in the 2024 review.
- On March 13, 2026, HiAnime’s official domains displayed a farewell message. Contemporaneous reporting said there was no public evidence at the time tying the message to a particular enforcement action.
- USTR’s 2026 Special 301 report later described Vietnam-based HiAnime.to as having shut down in April 2026, along with related mirrors. The March and April dates may refer to different points: the main site’s public farewell versus the broader shutdown of mirrors or the period reflected in USTR’s later review.
Accordingly, the careful conclusion is that the original HiAnime operation appears to be defunct as of August 10, 2026, but the public record does not prove that the USTR listing alone brought it down. Nor does one unavailable domain prove that every related operator, mirror, or copied service has vanished.
What the Vietnam investigation adds
Vietnam became especially important in the later enforcement story because USTR and rightsholders had repeatedly associated major piracy operations with the country. In July 2026, Vietnamese authorities announced charges against seven suspects in a cross-border investigation into a large alleged piracy and money-laundering network.
According to the Vietnamese legal publication’s account of the announcement, authorities alleged that the group:
- operated more than 100 websites;
- offered more than 26,000 unlicensed films;
- ran the operation from 2020 through April 2026; and
- generated approximately 12.85 million USDT in advertising proceeds, reported as about 308.4 billion Vietnamese dong.
Four suspects were reportedly charged with copyright infringement and money laundering, while three were charged with copyright infringement. The announcement said information from U.S. investigators, Homeland Security, and the MPA/ACE contributed to the investigation.
There is an important limitation. The Vietnamese written announcement did not explicitly name HiAnime. Later reporting connected the investigation to HiAnime after state-broadcaster footage reportedly showed HiAnime.to in connection with the case. The responsible wording is therefore that the investigation was reportedly linked to or included a network associated with HiAnime, not that a court has definitively established that HiAnime’s operators were among the charged individuals.
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Separately, USTR’s 2026 Special 301 report classified Vietnam as a Priority Foreign Country over broader intellectual-property enforcement concerns. That classification provides diplomatic context, but it is not itself proof of the legal status of any particular HiAnime defendant.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What readers should know about replacement domains
A domain using the HiAnime, Aniwatch, or Zoro name is not automatically an official successor. After a prominent site disappears, unrelated operators can copy its branding, interface, logo, catalog presentation, or social-media identity. Some domains may be mirrors; others may be clones or impersonators.
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That creates both legal and security problems. A familiar name does not verify who operates a site, whether its content is authorized, or whether its advertising, downloads, apps, and payment prompts are safe. This article does not provide active mirror addresses, unofficial apps, or instructions for bypassing blocks.
For legal viewing, readers should check licensed anime services available in their region through their official websites or apps. Catalogs, subtitles, dubs, release timing, and subscription options vary by country, so availability should be verified directly with the service rather than through an unofficial mirror list.
Why this case matters beyond anime
HiAnime’s listing was significant because it showed how copyright enforcement now follows audiences, infrastructure, and revenue—not just individual web addresses. A site with tens of millions of estimated visitors can be difficult to remove through a single domain action if its operators can redirect users, rely on third-party delivery systems, and monetize traffic through a distributed network.
It also demonstrates why headlines need to distinguish among three separate events:
- Industry nomination: the MPA’s October 2024 submission recommended or highlighted HiAnime to USTR.
- Government listing: USTR published the final 2024 Notorious Markets List on January 8, 2025.
- Law-enforcement action: courts and authorities in relevant jurisdictions may separately investigate, charge, prosecute, or seize assets. The later Vietnam case belongs to this third category.
Keeping those categories separate prevents two common errors: treating a trade-policy report as a conviction, and treating the disappearance of a domain as proof that the entire operation has ended.
Frequently Asked Questions
Was HiAnime added to a U.S. streaming list in 2024?
No. USTR included HiAnime.to in its 2024 Notorious Markets List, which covers online and physical markets reportedly associated with piracy and counterfeiting. USTR released that 2024 review on January 8, 2025.
Was HiAnime the same site as Zoro.to and Aniwatch.to?
USTR described HiAnime as a successor or rebrand associated with Zoro.to and Aniwatch.to. That supports the public brand sequence, but it does not conclusively establish that the same legal entity or owners controlled every version.
Did the USTR listing order HiAnime to be shut down?
No. The Notorious Markets List is not a court order, criminal conviction, or automatic blocking directive. It can increase attention and pressure, but the available evidence does not show that the 2024 listing alone caused HiAnime’s later closure.
Is HiAnime still operating?
The original HiAnime operation appears to have gone offline. Its official domains displayed a farewell message on March 13, 2026, and USTR later described HiAnime and related mirrors as shut down in April. Any similarly named live domain should be treated as potentially unofficial rather than assumed to be an official successor.
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Bottom line: The site was HiAnime.to, formerly associated with Zoro.to and Aniwatch.to. USTR included it in the final 2024 Notorious Markets List released on January 8, 2025, after the MPA cited an estimated 209.5 million August 2024 visits. The designation highlighted a major reported piracy market, but it was not a court finding or shutdown order. HiAnime later appears to have closed amid wider enforcement activity, including a Vietnam investigation reportedly linked to the network, although the public evidence does not establish a simple one-to-one cause or definitively prove every ownership connection.
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