Top 25 Best Selling Anime

[wing zero alpha]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1ynLdJDvc5w

Take it as you will, and please no flames.

[Destiny_Gundam]

Evangelion at #1? First Gundam at #2? No surprises there. But SEED Destiny at #3? I'm quite surprised and rather amused that it sold better than Zeta Gundam. I'm rather happy to see that Double Zeta made the list, as it's my favourite UC Gundam series.

Seeing that Haruhi and Code Geass has sold so well in such a (relatively) short time is also not surprising.

[Nightwing03]

Wow! Most of my favourite animes in there, and GO HARUHI! WOOO. Also Nadesico was in there so i'm happy. Although it does seem strange that SEED/D beat Z and ZZ. For the final 2 there was a really really big gap in scores. Evangelion more than doubled MSG's score.

[Black Knight]

Those totals, frankly, seem far too low for any of those shows; if those were totals of only the most recent DVD releases, it'd be a tad more believable. I'll take everything there with just a tiny grain of salt.

[Recon 5]

Well, Conan Boy From the Future was a surprise, as was Lupin. I expected ZZ to rate higher, though, and Patlabor not to rate at all.

Man, Suzumiya Haruhi beat Bebop! How can this be?

Geass was understandable and the SEEDs were popular even if they weren't the best in terms of quality. I'm a little surprised that DESTINY beat the original, though.

And finally, Evangelion... looks like the popularity of an anime is directly proportional to how controversial it is, I guess... or maybe Gainax just has some sort of golden touch.

Where are Bleach and Naruto in all of this?

[Deacon Blues]

Those totals, frankly, seem far too low for any of those shows; if those were totals of only the most recent DVD releases, it'd be a tad more believable. I'll take everything there with just a tiny grain of salt.

They're not for the complete series, but for single volumes mainly. 一巻平均 means 'volume average'. Special edition II for GSD sold 34,000 copies total, so...

[Hyakushiki]

And finally, Evangelion... looks like the popularity of an anime is directly proportional to how controversial it is, I guess... or maybe Gainax just has some sort of golden touch.

Eva being in the #1 spot may have more to do with new Evangelion movie coming in Japan last year, it inspired interest in the series yet again and Gainax knows how to milk its cash cow for every drop.

[Black Knight]

They're not for the complete series, but for single volumes mainly. 一巻平均 means 'volume average'. Special edition II for GSD sold 34,000 copies total, so...

Sure, volume average is the natural way to tally things; but didn't it also claim it was totaling all VHS, Laserdisc, DVD, etc formats? That's how I was interpreting the alphabet soup, and in that respect starting things off at barely 20,000 unit average per volume seems pretty low for some of those shows which have been popular for 10-20 years, with at least one release for every media format.

[Yuusha Tokkyu Might Gaine]

I'm shocked that Naruto wasn't anywhere on that list.

[Neo-Era]

The way I'm reading the opening message, it's a total average of each format (VHS, LD, DVD, blahblah) so I'm thinking they did something like taking the average sales for every volume on VHS, average sales for every LD volume and so on and then added all those numbers to each other and divided by the number of different formats to get a single number for each anime. 10,000-20,000 copies sold of a single DVD volume of an anime release looks to be considered solid sales in Japan. It's rare for a single anime DVD to sell 100,000 units.

Some things that need to be put into perspective:
- This ranking is of TV anime only. Compilations, movie versions, fan discs and the like aren't included in the calculations. Nearly all of the highest selling anime DVD's are theatrical. Hayao Miyazaki's Studio Ghibli releases routinely crush the sales of any other anime out there by an order of magnitude. Gedo Senki, not even done by Hayao, was a comparitive underperformer by Ghibli standards but still sold about 242,000 copies and was 2007's #1 anime DVD in Japan. The Zeta Gundam movies each sold around 150,000 copies or so, making them big hits by non-Ghibli standards.

- OVA's also aren't included. Rankings from 2ch show Gundam 0083, Stargazer, 08th MS Team, and Endless Waltz all in the top 10.

- The thing I like about lists like this is that they clearly show what a monster First Gundam is. You always see people on (English-speaking) message boards saying "Why are they doing another One Year War videogame?" or "How many Master Grade RX-78-2's can they make?" Well, if the video sales of a 30-year-old anime can go toe-to-toe with the likes of the best selling anime today, isn't it obvious? Gundam SEED, Fullmetal Alchemist, Haruhi, & Code Geass are all modern anime success stories and First Gundam still manages to hang with them. People need to get this through their skulls.

[azrael]

Geass was understandable and the SEEDs were popular even if they weren't the best in terms of quality. I'm a little surprised that DESTINY beat the original, though.

And finally, Evangelion... looks like the popularity of an anime is directly proportional to how controversial it is, I guess... or maybe Gainax just has some sort of golden touch.

SEED and GSD may not have had the best story but both were very successful financially.

Gainax's golden touch seems to have been only on Evangelion. They've made other shows but none have compared to the level of fandom that Evangelion has had, so in this case, credit really goes to the producers of the show as opposed to the animation studio.

[WhiteWingDemon]

Since it is strictly based on sales I do think that there is a bit of a slant towards older anime.

#25 G.I.T.S. S.A.C. 2nd Gig
#21 Love Hina
#20 ZZ Gundam
#18 Gundam Wing
#14 Dragonball GT
#13 Lupin the third
#12 Full Metal Alchemist
#9 Dragonball Z
#8 Cowboy Bebop
#7 The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
#6 Code Geass
#5 Zeta Gundam
#4 Gundam Seed
#3 Gundam Seed Destiny
#2 Mobile Suit Gundam
#1 Evangelion


I apologize for the ones I missed.

Anyways, wow. MSG and Seed was sort of expected as wekk as Zeta. I think it says alot about Code Geass since it is a relatively young anime, but it has become this popular. I was disappointed about Ghost in the Shell though. I honestly thought it would do much better than it did, but then again it isn't an anime that appeals to a large amount of people.

[Black Knight]

Since it is strictly based on sales I do think that there is a bit of a slant towards older anime.

On the other hand, those older shows which got releases in formats which never really caught on, like LD, might be said to have a penalty.

Some of the ones you missed:


#23 Azumanga Daioh
#22 Air
#19 Fate/Stay Night
#17 Patlabor
#16 Initial D Fourth Stage
#10 Nadesico

[padre]

Might as well do the rest...

#24 Cardcaptor Sakura
#15 Future Boy Conan
#11 Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water

Nadia is also a Gainax production, so their "golden touch" extends at least a little further than Evangelion.

EDIT:

Hmm, the list Neo-Era linked to isn't consistent with the one wing zero alpha linked to.

The second list is:

#1 Evangelion
#2 Mobile Suit Gundam
#3 Gundam Seed Destiny
#4 Gundam 0083
#5 Gundam Seed Stargazer
#6 Gundam Seed
#7 Zeta Gundam
#8 Gundam: The 08th MS Team
#9 Gundam Wing: Endless Waltz
#10 Oh My Goddess! OVA
#11 The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
#12 Gunbuster
#13 Cowboy Bebop
#14 Dragon Ball Z
#15 Nadesico
#16 Fullmetal Alchemist
#17 Lupin III
#18 Nadia: The Secret of Blue Water
#19 You're Under Arrest! OVA
#20 Future Boy Conan

Code Geass is not on the second list at all, while Nadia is lower than Fullmetal Alchemist and Lupin III, rather than higher. Dragon Ball GT is also missing (or perhaps was simply lower than Future Boy Conan). Strangely, some of the sales figures on the second list match those on the first exactly, while others are lower. None are higher.

I wonder which is the more accurate list.

[NewtypeS3]

Honestly, I'm not suprised that 0083 and 08th MS Team have such high sales. They were released direct-to-video, meaning they had to sell on the label and word-of-mouth rather than a pre-estblished fanbase of that show at first.
And considering it's Gundam, both released at a near-fever-pitch of Gundam fandom, depending on the definition... it's almost a no-brainer, yanno?

[Neo-Era]

Code Geass is not on the second list at all, while Nadia is lower than Fullmetal Alchemist and Lupin III, rather than higher. Dragon Ball GT is also missing (or perhaps was simply lower than Future Boy Conan). Strangely, some of the sales figures on the second list match those on the first exactly, while others are lower. None are higher.

I wonder which is the more accurate list.

That list I linked to has been around on 2ch for awhile and Code Geass only recently hit video. Don't know about the other discrepancies.

[Strike]

Seeing ZZ on there was a bit of a shock.

[Cardi Doorl]

- This ranking is of TV anime only. Compilations, movie versions, fan discs and the like aren't included in the calculations.

Wait, then what were the Zeta New Translation compilation movies doing there?

[wing zero alpha]

Wait, then what were the Zeta New Translation compilation movies doing there?

I think that was meant for the Z Gundam DVDs rather than the compilation movies, but I could be wrong.

[Neo-Era]

It is the Zeta TV series. Whoever put the video together just used the New Translation logo for whatever reason.