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For anime series released during the 2025 calendar year, Takopi’s Original Sin and The Summer Hikaru Died are the closest thing to consensus picks in the available fan-vote results—but neither is a universal winner. The strongest choice for you depends on whether you want a new series, a returning season, or a particular genre. This guide weighs storytelling, direction, animation, character work, genre distinction and accessibility, using polls and awards as signals rather than substitutes for episode-by-episode reviews.
How this 2025 list is scoped
“2025” here means series released during the calendar year, not anime honored at a ceremony held in 2025. Award cycles and festival polls use different eligibility windows, so their results are useful context only when those distinctions are kept clear.
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- The 2025 Crunchyroll Anime Awards honored work from 2024; its Anime of the Year was Solo Leveling. Sony reported 51 million votes for that awards cycle, but that figure does not make it a ranking of 2025 releases. Sony Group Corporation’s 2025 report and the 2025 Crunchyroll nominees announcement identify the relevant context.
- The 2026 Crunchyroll Anime Awards are the retrospective award cycle covering 2025; My Hero Academia FINAL SEASON was named Anime of the Year. See the 2026 winners.
- The Tokyo Anime Award Festival 2026 fan Best 100 used an eligibility window of October 1, 2024 through September 30, 2025. Its voting therefore does not represent only calendar-year 2025 releases. The festival reported 54,023 voters and 120,955 votes. Tokyo Anime Award Festival 2026 results and eligibility details.
The picks below lean most heavily on Anime Corner’s 2025 fan poll and the 2025 /r/anime awards results. Fan polls reflect the preferences of their participants, not a representative sample of all viewers, and awards use their own rules and electorates. The evidence supports recognition and comparison, not definitive claims about which show is artistically best.
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Best anime series of 2025: the shortlist
Anime Corner’s poll drew 59,053 voters in 2026 for its retrospective 2025 Anime of the Year results. Its top two were separated by just 0.09 percentage points. The table pairs those signals with a practical starting point for choosing what to watch; it is not a quality ranking based on episode-by-episode review.
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| Series | Recognition in the cited results | Good starting point if you want… | Newcomer note |
|---|---|---|---|
| Takopi’s Original Sin | Anime Corner’s overall winner at 7.98%; also won its adaptation and sci-fi categories. | A highly discussed, emotionally intense drama. | New series. |
| The Summer Hikaru Died | Second overall at 7.89%; also a leading drama result and shared the /r/anime jury-awards lead, with two jury wins. | Suspense or horror. | New series. |
| The Apothecary Diaries Season 2 | Third overall at 7.21%; won Anime Corner’s drama category and led /r/anime’s public awards by total wins. The /r/anime results list six public awards and one jury award. | A returning-season choice with strong award and poll results. | Season two; start with the earlier season for the continuing story. |
| My Hero Academia FINAL SEASON | Fourth overall at 7.04%; topped Anime Corner’s action and animation categories and won Anime of the Year at the 2026 Crunchyroll Anime Awards. | Action, especially if you already follow the franchise. | Finale season; familiarity with the earlier seasons matters. |
| To Be Hero X | Fifth overall at 6.23%; won Anime Corner’s original-anime category. | An original-series pick rather than another adaptation or returning property. | New series. |
| Re:ZERO -Starting Life in Another World- Season 3 | Sixth overall at 5.38% in Anime Corner’s poll. | Returning fantasy viewers. | Season three; best approached with the preceding seasons. |
| Gachiakuta | Seventh overall at 5.25%; won Anime Corner’s adventure and world-building categories. | A setting-led action-adventure. | New series. |
Poll percentages are the shares reported in Anime Corner’s retrospective results; they are not scores out of ten or critic ratings. Its own results page cautions that fan rankings reflect voter preferences rather than prescribing what readers should watch. Anime Corner’s 2025 poll results.
Which new 2025 anime should you watch?
For the closest poll race: Takopi’s Original Sin
It finished first in Anime Corner’s overall fan poll, but its 7.98% share put it only 0.09 percentage points ahead of The Summer Hikaru Died. Its wins in the adaptation and sci-fi categories strengthen its case as a standout, while the poll alone cannot establish how well its story or direction will work for any particular viewer.
For an original-series pick: To Be Hero X
Anime Corner named it the winner of the original-anime category as well as placing it fifth overall. That makes it a useful counterweight to a list that also includes adaptations and established franchises.
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For adventure and setting: Gachiakuta
Its adventure and world-building category wins offer a clear reason to consider it if setting and action-adventure are your priorities. Its seventh-place overall result is a separate measure from those category wins.
Which returning seasons are worth considering?
The Apothecary Diaries Season 2
Its third-place overall finish and drama-category win in Anime Corner’s poll are reinforced by /r/anime’s 2025 awards: the public results table lists six wins and the jury table one, for seven total. Those awards are a community signal, not a population-representative poll. Because this is a continuing season, viewers unfamiliar with the series should begin earlier rather than treating season two as a standalone entry.
The /r/anime awards results distinguish public voting from jury awards. The jury results also spread recognition across works including CITY, My Dress-Up Darling Season 2, Milky Subway and The Summer Hikaru Died, each of which received two jury wins.
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My Hero Academia FINAL SEASON
It is the clearest action-focused recommendation in this shortlist: Anime Corner’s poll placed it fourth overall and at the top of its action and animation categories, and the 2026 Crunchyroll awards named it Anime of the Year. It is also a finale season, not an entry point; its poll standing does not remove the value of knowing the franchise beforehand.
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Anime Corner placed the third season sixth overall. That result gives returning fantasy viewers a reason to keep it on the list, but does not make it a newcomer-friendly starting season.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.How to read the awards and poll results
These measures answer different questions. Anime Corner’s overall fan poll ranks preferences among its voters, while its genre categories show which titles led within particular groupings. The /r/anime awards separate public and jury results. Crunchyroll’s official award is another distinct process, and its ceremony year may differ from the release year of the eligible work.
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That is why the 2025 Crunchyroll result—Solo Leveling as Anime of the Year—should not be presented as proof it was the best series released in 2025: that ceremony covered 2024 work. By contrast, the 2026 Crunchyroll award to My Hero Academia FINAL SEASON is a retrospective signal for 2025. The festival’s Best 100 has yet another boundary, spanning October 2024 to September 2025. No single result settles a universal ranking.
Where to watch these anime
Streaming availability varies by title, country and date. The cited material does not establish current, region-by-region catalogs for the recommended series, so check the services available in your territory before choosing a title. Sony’s 2025 corporate report mentions Solo Leveling on Crunchyroll in its awards coverage; that does not establish current availability for every show on this list or in every region.
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