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Plenty of ongoing manga titles were just as fun to read in 2025 as they were in years past, but sure enough, the various new manga that dropped throughout the year have also had plenty to offer both visually and narratively. A few new manga especially stand out as being great, and hopefully, they’ll become mainstays for years to come.
10) Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Exceeds
Masaki Tsuzuki and Shuichi Kawakami’s Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Exceeds is the latest entry into the Lyrical Nanoha franchise. Several years after the Reflection and Detonation films, Nanoha, now 13, has joined the Time-Space Administration Bureau’s new Exceeds unit, and her latest mission involves investigating a planet’s ruthless hunt for a mysterious witch.
It’s been almost a decade since there was new Nanoha content, and with its great action and character writing, Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha Exceeds is more than a welcome addition. A new Nanoha anime is also set to air in 2026, and if it’s as good as the manga, then the franchise will be the strongest it’s been in years.
9) Marchen Crown
In Aka Akasaka, Aoi Kujira, and Azychika’s Marchen Crown, Rapunzel is freed from a life stuck inside a tower by a kind boy named Mikel, but what began as an ideal love story quickly takes a turn for the horrifying as they’re thrown into a world teeming with monsters and violence.
While Marchen Crown doesn’t start on the best note, once it finds its footing, it becomes a surprisingly fun action story that does a great job of adding a horror element to classic fairy tales. It might not be Aka Akasaka’s strongest work, but fortunately, that doesn’t make it any less fun to read.
8) #Gal X Gal Yuri
Inoue’s #Gal x Gal Yuri stars Yua and Reina, two gyaru girls who, after striking out in the dating scene one too many times, decide to go out with each other for a year. That being said, what started as a random whim quickly evolves into true love, and the two are all the happier for it.
Inoue chose to serialize #Gal x Gal Yuri after the overwhelmingly positive response to the original one-shot, and with how sweet Yua and Reina’s relationship is and how fun the slice-of-life elements are, it’s easy to see why. Any positive representation in manga is great to see, and #Gal x Gal Yuri easily has some of the best of 2025.
7) Idolatry
In Shin Ootaka and Homare’s Idolatry, Junna Harumi is crushed when her favorite idol, Fuwari Tsukishiro, leaves her idol group, but after finding out that Fuwari is auditioning for a new idol group, Junna will do whatever it takes to help her reach the top, no matter how many lines she might have to cross.
While Idolatry is fairly new, the series is already fun to read not just for its great art, but for how utterly deranged Junna and other characters can be as they all pursue their goals. Idolatry can be seen as Blue Lock for the idol genre, and so far, that’s working for it in the best of ways.
6) War Of The Adults
In Kappy and Masaaki Tsuzuki’s War of the Adults, after Yutaro Urashima is hit by a truck while saving a cat, he awakens 15 years later to discover that a politician, inspired by Yutaro’s heroism, has turned Japan into a surveillance state to reward “true adults”, and Yutaro will do whatever it takes to put an end to it.
With an engaging cast of characters and a plot that’s equal parts drama and satire, War of the Adults is always a fun read that can be entertaining with any sort of tone. The series always finds new ways to outdo itself in shocking ways, and hopefully, it won’t be slowing down anytime soon.
5) Someone Hertz
Ei Yamano’s Someone Hertz stars Mimei Fukumori, a boy who, despite his best efforts, can never get his jokes read on his favorite late-night radio show. After learning that his friend, Kurage Mizuo, is one of the show’s frequent contributors, though, the two start working together to help develop Mimei’s craft, although that might not be the whole story.
