
Sony subsidiary Crunchyroll will expand upon its anime streaming with a manga app, scheduled to release later this year.
Announced at CES 2025, the service is described as a “premium add-on” to its existing offering, but there’s been no word on which titles will be included in its catalogue. Obviously, content is king when it comes to digital offerings like this.
It’s actually not the first time Crunchyroll has offered manga, as it delivered a similar service prior to its discontinuation in 2023. The catalogue wasn’t great, however, and the user experience was often described as buggy. It’ll need to do better this time if it really wants to entice customers to pay extra.
Is this something you’d be interested in? Are you already subscribed to a manga app like Viz Media? Do you prefer to read your comics physically? Let us know in the comments section below.
[source crunchyroll.com]
Comments 17
I'll be interested to see the price.
If they get the rights to stuff like Berserk I might give it a go. Save me from digging out those big Berserk Deluxe volumes whenever I want to read them.
@Shepherd_Tallon agreed. I'd be happy of the price is decent. Coukd do with a good working app where we can legally read manga. Would make catching up on one piece a lot easier
As others have said price is key. They are in a good position to offer plenty of content.
@Batesy125s “ Would make catching up on one piece a lot easier “
My kid has been subscribed to a service basically just for One Piece. He subscribes for a month, reads a 150 episode arc, then takes a break for awhile. I think he said he’s almost finished now. As an unemployed college grad he has nothing but time now.😩
Happy to see this is a thing, all growth in the industry is good. I wonder how this will work with current subscribers, I bought my other kid a year of Crunchyroll for Christmas. Though that kid doesn’t read much, too busy watching. 🤷🏻♂️
I'm still stunned they haven't bundled this with PS Plus
@Keyblade-Dan Came here to say this.
We live in a society built on too many subscriptions and not enough money. Customers will pick the best and leave the rest. Amazon Prime for example bundles in about seven different things for actually a very reasonable price. PS Premium though? Eh...
Depending on the content and the price I might give their app a try.
Nah, HakuNeko and Chunky reader for tablet is all I need. Most of the manga I read doesn't have official translations though.
It will take something great to get me off of what Viz Media's offering. That app delivers some of the best cheap entertainment money can buy!
@Shepherd_Tallon i will definetily recommend to buy a paper version of Berserk. The art is too good to read only digital (as many other mangas).
I might be interested but it will totally depend on the content. Start with all Shonen Jump old and ongoing and add classics, lets see how it goes.
@dardel tbh when it's finally finished I'll probably pick up the inevitable boxset too.
I have the Deluxe versions and you're right, the artwork on the page is absolutely fantastic.
@rjejr yeah I've started watching one piece with my son, after watching the live action, which I thought was decent.
But with the amount of time we get to watch it will be years before we're ever caught up, if ever. With the mange I should be able to read a lot more quickly and actually get to a point where I can just watch the episodes as and when they release. (That's assuming the anime actually sticks to the manga)
They did this in the past and it failed.
I'm open to it if they offer something decent, but it's going to be hard to compete with already established manga apps like the Shonen Jump App and MangaPlus.
I'll just recommend Manga Fire, y'all
Shonen Jump is £3 a month, which is pretty decent considering the amount of series that are on there.
Physical still for me.
A fair service but eh. I only get their anime physical because licensing wise I don't have a choice. Manga I have many choices, I don't need to use this.
Many that would be of interested aren't offered so, other means. Even those that flopped yeah well not much point to support if makes no difference. But I read/play for enjoyable not always to support them to be around longer.
The last one they had sucked so I hope this one is better.
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