Why WEBTOON could pose a challenge to Crunchyroll’s anime strategy

Anime is having a moment in Western markets. Signals of its popularity are continuously flashing across the entertainment industry, from the Naruto-inspired celebrations of Tottenham Hotspur striker Dominic Solanke to Dolce & Gabbana’s high fashion collaboration with JUJUTSU KAISEN. Anime’s ability to cut through a fragmented and hyper-competitive entertainment landscape has made it the kid on the block that everyone wants to play with.

Among Gen Alpha gamers aged between eight and 12, anime fandom is not just experiencing a hot streak but building the foundations for mainstream adoption across the West. Analysis of the top 50 most revisited games in the official Roblox chart found that 22% had an anime theme. Core to this global success is Crunchyroll, the Sony-owned streaming platform dedicated to anime TV shows, movies, and Japanese cultural fandom. Since 2006, Crunchyroll has evolved from a provider of unauthorised content to the premium consumption experience for anime fans outside of Japan. Propelled by its merger with rival Funimation in 2022, Crunchyroll now hosts more 1,000 titles across 248 markets. Subscribers are up from 5 million to 15 million from 2021 to August 2024. This is largely driven by a dual-pronged approach. 

Crunchyroll’s global licencing deals have created a catalogue that caters to both casual and super fans of anime. While the service operates as a regular streaming service, it also functions as a fandom hub where fans can engage beyond watching their favourite shows. These include mobile games linked to popular anime IPs, an in-app ecommerce store offering merchandise, music videos from JPop artists, and a portal that markets Crunchyroll’s IRL events; all are essential to nurturing and engaging with the anime community.

This focus on distribution and fandom has driven success – but is it enough to maintain momentum? Has Crunchyroll left no stone unturned, or can it better serve anime fans without clouding the proposition or overburdening its users?  If Crunchyroll is to broaden its fandom proposition, deepen its trove IP, and contain competitors, it should consider how to better serve its anime fans.

To achieve this, Crunchyroll should create a space for self-publishing digital comic creators to release and monetise their works. Creating an on-platform creator offer would be a significant investment and diversification of strategy for Crunchyroll, and there would be long-term benefits. Crunchyroll would deepen its position within anime fandom by becoming a collective home for the digital comic and anime community outside of Japan. It could also claim a stake in the digital comics published on the platform, giving it first refusal for turning them into shows or a share of licencing revenues for third-party adaptions.

Crunchyroll announced in January 2025 that it was creating a standalone digital comic app, Crunchyroll Manga. While this could act as a staging post towards a self-publishing creator offer,  the experience would need to be integrated within the existing Crunchyroll app to avoid splitting the user base.

WEBTOON’s threat

Crunchyroll is not the only platform capable of pursuing super app strategy. Take WEBTOON, the Los Angeles based digital app for South Korean style webcomics and self-publishing creators. It is becoming a central hub for digital comic creators by hosting 24 million amateur and professionals, the latter of which are earning between $48,000 and $1 million per year. Anyone can publish on WEBTOON’s CANVAS platform, but creators only become eligible for monetisation once they achieve certain audience benchmarks.

If Crunchyroll’s question is: should it pursue a creator strategy? Then WEBTOON’s question is: should it pursue an SVOD strategy? WEBTOON already has its own in-house production company, Studio N and Wattpad WEBTOON Studios, the former of which produced Vigilante for Disney+ / Hulu. According to Forbes, half of the Netflix Korean originals in 2023 were adapted from WEBTOON IP. An SVOD strategy would expand upon WEBTOON’s cross-entertainment approach and provide opportunities for premium content monetisation through in-app subscriptions.

Who will seize the opportunity?

Both WEBTOON and Crunchyroll should not shy away from deepening their cross-entertainment strategy. Modern consumers want a multi-faceted entertainment experience that enables them to engage with the IP they love on their terms. This means IP holders risk leaving engagement on the table if they fail to super serve scenes like anime fans or web comics readers.

READ MORE: MIDiA has unpacked the secret formula behind anime’s popularity. Entertainment companies, marketers and brands wanting to engage the anime scene should explore our report ‘Leveraging Anime | A nuanced scene not a genre’.