The Best Anime Streaming Services for 2024 (2024)

Years ago, life was hard for American anime fans. A few influential shows made it to broadcast, but US studios either meddled with the editing, produced subpar dubs, or both. By the early 2000s, US fans traded illegally duplicated VHS tapes or (if they were lucky) tiny RealPlayer files of their favorite shows on CD-R.

All that changed with the advent of legal, subscription-based video streaming services. Anime streaming services give fans huge libraries to peruse and, for the first time, subtitled or dubbed releases within hours of an episode's overseas premiere.If you want to start watching anime online, these tested, highlighted services represent the top places to stream animation. Then keep reading to learn how to get the most out of the experience.

Deeper Dive: Our Top Tested Picks

Buying Guide: The Best Anime Streaming Services for 2024

Is Streaming Anime Legal?

Anime fans have long been at the mercy of gatekeepers. First, it was media importers, who brought over only the series they felt would work with American audiences. Later, it was the fansubbing community that labored to bring their favorite shows to their peers through file-sharing services of dubious legality.

Video streaming services changed all of that. Sites like Crunchyroll and Hidive provide all-you-can-watch viewing for a single monthly price, and they're completely legal. These options are also far, far cheaper than physical media—which, for imported shows and movies, has been disgustingly expensive for decades. Plus, digital distribution means there's no scarcity of product, shipping fees, or physical overhead for the provider.

As far as pricing goes, anime streaming services won't break the bank. In fact, most services come in under $10 per month. Crunchyroll even offers a free tier. Of course, you get more features and quality-of-life improvements with the paid tiers. For instance, Crunchyroll's premium version removes ads from the experience. Hulu’s premium tier adds offline downloads and gets rid of most of the ads on the service, save for a select few programs.A Hidive subscription costs $4.99 per month.

Some completely free streaming services may have some anime worth watching, too. RetroCrush’s curated catalog of cool and mostly exclusive, classic anime is entirely free with surprisingly infrequent ads, but it doesn’t even offer the option of premium features. The iconic Gundam franchise sidesteps streaming services entirely, with the rights holder putting episodes up for free on its own channels. Still, nostalgia is hard to resist when it doesn’t cost anything. And yes, there are dozens of websites that let you stream anime and cartoons for free. We don’t recommend them because of their sketchy legality. If you decide to take your chances anyway, consider using the Tor browser or a VPN, at the very least.

Which Streaming Service Has the Best Anime?

One of the biggest differentiators between services is the size of the catalog. Of the standalone services, Crunchyroll currently leads the pack with around 1,300 anime series, a library that has grown even bigger after absorbing Funimation and VRV in 2022. Hulu and Netflix, each with an impressive anime library of its own, sit well behind Crunchyroll with each having between 200 and 300 combined anime shows and movies. Hidive has approximately 500 series and movies in its collection. RetroCrush features 100 shows and 40 films.

Of course, it's not just the quantity of the shows that matters. Although many popular shows are available on more than one platform, each service we reviewed has a specialty.

For instance, Crunchyroll generally has a lock on current, popular, and widely acclaimed shows, while Netflix has the distinction of original programming, such as The Seven Deadly Sins and its reboot of the Japanese collaboration Voltron. Netflix also frequently strikes deals with Japanese creators for new, original anime series, and it even features a new dub of the crown jewel that is Neon Genesis Evangelion.

RetroCrush’s catalog is small, but it’s the only place you’ll find Golgo 13: The Movie, Urusei Yatsura, and more vintage hits from the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. Hulu similarly offers older anime, such as Cowboy Bebop, FLCL, Ranma 1/2, Slayers, and Trigun.With Hidive, you can watch Darwin’s Game, Food Wars!, and Made in Abyss, as well as uncensored mature exclusives.

Anime Dubs vs. Subs

The fight between those who prefer subtitles (the correct way) and those who prefer English dubs (the incorrect way) is as bloody as historic Japan's Meiji period and as pointless as the Hatfield-McCoy feud. Fortunately, most services let you have it both ways. And, truth be told, there are advantages to both methods.

The 2016 partnership between Funimation and Crunchyroll pushed dubs to Funimation and subs to Crunchyroll. Now that both services are owned by Sony, and with Funimation being absorbed under the Crunchyroll brand, you can now enjoy a one-stop anime shop for subs and dubs.

Netflix has numerous language and subtitle tracks for most of its offerings. Hulu is spottier with subtitled films, but has Japanese language offerings for most shows. In contrast, subbed and dubbed videos on Hulu are presented as separate videos, and not just as an option in the video player. Crunchyroll and RetroCrush do this, too. That's a little annoying, but at least you have a choice. Hidive offers a mix of subs and dubs.

How to Watch Live Anime

Import television and movies have always come at a premium cost, and are often released sporadically and after long waits. Thankfully, the Internet is here to help with simulcasts.

The top services focusing on contemporary anime offer at least some simulcast programming. While the name implies a simultaneous release, it's actually usually a matter of hours after an episode premieres. Simulcasts let fans stay on the cutting edge of anime and stoke popularity in a way that binge-watching never could.

Crunchyroll currently has about 45 shows in its simulcast roster. Other services have far fewer. And since its merger with Funimation, Crunchyroll has also gained a rather unique service called SimulDub, which currently applies to about 25 shows for which it posts new English dubs on the same day that they air in Japan. For dubs fans, that's an incredible turnaround, and we hope to see the newly-merged Crunchyroll continue it.

How to Stream Anime

Most video streaming services are available on every device you own. Any modern web browser should be sufficient for streaming from any of the latest services. All the services in this roundup also offer apps for Android and iOS devices, so you can watch your favorite shows wherever you go. Each service also supports at least two simultaneous streams, so one person can watch on the TV while another person watches on a separate device. RetroCrush doesn't even ask you to create an account.

Crunchyroll now lets you download videos for mobile offline viewing. The other premium services also all support this feature in their paid tiers.

The TV experience is no longer a major differentiator, either, given the affordability and prevalence of media streaming devices. All the anime streaming services in this roundup support Chromecasts, Rokus, Apple TVs, and Fire TV Sticks. Support for gaming consoles is a similar, if more mixed, story. RetroCrush isn’t on any game consoles. Crunchyroll and Hulu are available on the Nintendo Switch.

Which Service Offer More Than Just Anime?

Anime is a rarified, fan-driven experience, so many streaming services do a lot more than merely serve up shows. For example, Crunchyroll has integrated and lively forum communities. It also offers stores. Crunchyroll's shop is mildly disorganized compared with other services, but you do get in-store bonuses and special access to convention events with a top-tier account. The relatively sparse RetroCrush could use these community features, but a shop would feel out of place on a free service. Hidive lets you create and share chat rooms so you can watch synced videos with friends while adding your own commentary.

Crunchyroll also offers digital comics, with a decent digital library of manga titles you can read in the browser. A DC Universe Infinite membership grants you access to about 25,000 online comics. In fact, DC Universe Infinite has pivoted entirely to comics, as its original shows, like Doom Patrol and Harley Quinn, moved to HBO Max. If digital comics are your game, you're better off with Comixology, though.

What Is the Best Anime Streaming Site?

If you don’t want to go over budget, make sure to think about the value these services provide, especially if no one else in your household watches anime. In that case, Netflix and Hulu have a clear advantage because of their mainstream original productions and massive catalogs of other shows. Crunchyroll's expansive and singular anime collection, which now includes Funimation's dubs and VRV's indie cartoons, earns it our Editors’ Choice award for the category. Note that for this roundup, we count animation and anime series jointly as the distinction between the two genres is not always clear, and arguably arbitrary in a current global, geeky world.

For more on streaming, check out five reasons why you may want to ditch your video subscription andkeep cable, and read how streaming has ushered in a newtrash TV golden age.