Over the last few years, there is a new trending anime subgenre has been booming, “Isekai anime.” But what is Isekai anime? What does Isekai mean? In this article, you will get these answers along with the top Isekai anime of all time. Let’s begin!
Sword Art Online
Sword Art Online feels like the pioneer in this genre, as it absolutely blew up after only a few episodes.
Its reputation has gone down as people like to point out how bland and uninspired the main protagonist(Kirito Christ) is.
But I think the show is still a lot of fun.
The animation is superb, the fights are pretty hyped, it had one of the best pilot episodes, and some of the plot lines are rather interesting.
Plus it has like a million spin-offs so you’re bound to find at least one that suits your taste. Gun Gale is my guilty pleasure to be honest.
Arifureta: From Commonplace to World’s Strongest
As the title might suggest, this is a zero to hero story.
It all starts when our protagonist Hajime and his class are transported into a fantasy world with the mission of saving the world.
Everyone gets really strong combat powers except our boy Hajime, who ends up with a niche transmutation power. His class quickly screws him over and he’s left in a labyrinth to fight for himself.
He uses his wits to make that niche power of his even more powerful, and to eventually become the strongest in the world. The show falls under guilty pleasure as it might not have the best writing ever, but man is it entertaining.
My Next Life as a Villainess: All Routes Lead to Doom!
This feels like metagaming-the anime.
Our protagonist, Katarina, is reborn inside of a video game she used to play. However, she’s born into the role of the villainess and she quickly regains her memory from her past life, meaning that she knows she’s evil and is going to die by the end of the campaign.
So she has to do her best to progress the story but avoid ever reaching a conclusion in order for her head to remain on her shoulders.
Again, the concept alone was enough to reel me in. And the cast of lovable characters only furthered my enjoyment.
In Another World With My Smartphone
The premise is exactly what the title promises: a guy gets struck by lightning on accident and God goes “I’m so sorry fam, any way I can make it up to you? How about a fantasy world plus anything you wish for?”
And the MC promptly asks to take his smartphone with him.
The show goes harem mode pretty quickly, but the protagonist is way more ballsy than most MCs in this position. And the way he goes about fighting is quite entertaining as well.
The Devil is a Part-Timer!
The Devil is a Part-Timer can be seen as the reverse isekai.
This is because in isekai shows a person from the “normal” world gets transported into a video game or a fantasy world. However this time around, literal Satan, his right-hand man, and fabled heroes get transported into modern day Japan.
Their magic is basically non-existent. And they soon have to face their strongest foe yet: capitalism and the minimum wage.
The show is a comedy and delivers on that front continuously from episode to episode, so I highly recommend giving it a watch if you haven’t already.
How Not to Summon a Demon Lord
Since we’re already talking about demons and devils, we might as well throw this show into the mix.
The setup is as basic as you can get in isekai: dude is the very best in a game and is now transported into that game where fanservice and harems await.
However, the show itself feels oddly fresh.
Firstly, the end goal of the show is to literally disband a spell that one girl messed up that made them the Demon Lord’s slave.
Secondly, there’s a linear plot instead of the usual monster of the week format.
It’s not winning any literary prizes. But the show is honestly really fun, and the MC is interesting enough to never truly drop your interest.
Cautious Hero: The Hero Is Overpowered but Overly Cautious
Isekai titles really just get to the point, don’t they?
So yeah, the protagonist is extremely overpowered but is really cautious, how does that work as a plot hook? Extremely well actually.
The humor is very absurd, like the protagonist blowing up an entire village just because he wanted to make sure that he properly killed that level 1 slime, and very unpredictable.
The secondary protagonist also has that Aqua vibe, and her voice actress is just top tier. Trust me, you will binge the show and leave with no regrets.
KonoSuba
As far as comedies go, KonoSuba is one of my all-time favorites.
Plot wise it’s pretty standard, with a guy dying, meeting a goddess who offers to resurrect him in a different world, so he ends up trolling the system and taking her along with him, etc.
However, the characters are anything but standard.
The male lead has no moral code whatsoever and will absolutely drop kick a woman in the name of equality. The goddess is anything but godly. Their tank is a pervert, and their mage is a one-pump-chump with a taste for destruction.
The show is hilarious and has my sincere approval.
Overlord
The main selling point of Overlord has to be its MMORPG word building, and the absolute power of the main character Ainz.
The catch is that only Ainz is transported into this world and the other NPCs simply gain life, meaning that he can metagame everything but also that he has no real stakes involved.
He does set out to conquer the world. But only as a means of gathering information and seeking out other players.
His position is the backbone of the show, as people constantly look to him as a God even though my dude is just an avid gamer, making him improvise everything on the spot.
The Rising of the Shield Hero
In The Rising of the Shield Hero we see a man take an L from life, and then build himself up to power.
Our protagonist, Naofumi, is transported into a different world alongside three other people and each is given a weapon.
Naofumi gets the short end of the stick and gets stuck with the shield.
The stick gets even shorter when he’s quickly outcast by the entire kingdom.
So we watch as he forms a rag-tag team of companions, who may or may not be slaves, and tries to help out the people around him while simultaneously giving the king the middle finger. It truly is a sight to behold.
No Game No Life
No Game No Life is notorious in the community for giving us one of the best seasons ever, and then promptly disappearing from the face of the Earth.
The concept is pretty simple: two genius siblings get transported into a fantasy world where everything is settled through games.
This might sound boring, but keep in mind the siblings are literal geniuses. The world is fantastical and the other characters have played games for profit their entire life.
All of this leads to the most hyped, unexpected, 300 IQ living figure chess matches that you will ever see.
That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime
To be honest, I can’t even explain what makes this show so good.
It’s about a dude who gets reincarnated as a slime. Surprise, right?
However, he soon becomes overpowered as he consumes a dragon and basically scales infinitely. He then just builds a village and does things village leaders have to do.
You know, goes to peace treaties, protects his citizens, seeks outside investment. It all sounds so typical, and yet the show just nails every point so well that you binge the show in a day and remember it fondly ever a year after.
Ascendance of a Bookworm
If you don’t feel like getting into another world-domination/war plot setup, but still want that isekai sauce, then Ascendance of a Bookworm should suffice.
The premise is honestly kind of unique in a way, it’s just about a girl who loved to read so much that she got reincarnated and just continued to love reading.
However, she’s plopped into a fantasy world. So books aren’t all that regularly available, and she has to get really creative with how she’s going to get her fix.
The show is pretty slice of life-y, but the execution is on point. So you get way more invested than you’d think.
People always say “it’s another overpowered protagonist”, but never ask “how is the overpowered protagonist?”.
In this show the protagonist is literally struggling from success, living her entire life alone and isolated as people envied her skills.
So when an opportunity arises to be reborn into a different world she begs the heavens to make her completely average.
But the heavens are complete trolls and make her a daughter of a noble with supreme magic abilities.
So she tries to be lowkey with her powers in order to live the average life she had always wanted, but that turns out to be a handful.
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