Jujutsu Kaisen (TV series)

Season 1

The series was announced by Weekly Shōnen Jump in November 2019.[6] The manga author, Gege Akutami, and the main cast members appeared at Jump Festa '20 on December 22, 2019.[7] The series was produced by MAPPA and directed by Sunghoo Park. Hiroshi Seko was in charge of the scripts, Tadashi Hiramatsu designed the characters.[8] While the anime had an advanced streaming debut on YouTube and Twitter on September 19, 2020,[9] it aired for 24 episodes on MBS and TBS's Super Animeism block from October 3, 2020, to March 27, 2021.[10][11][12] From episode 3 onwards, the series includes post-credits anime shorts titled "Juju Sanpo" (呪術さんぽ), which focus on the daily lives of the characters.[14]

Season 2

On February 12, 2022, a second season was announced.[15] Shōta Goshozono replaced Sunghoo Park as series director, with Sayaka Koiso and Hiramatsu designing the characters.[16] The season aired for 23 episodes from July 6 to December 28, 2023.[17][18] It ran for two continuous cours and respectively adapted the manga's Hidden Inventory / Premature Death (懐玉・玉折) and Shibuya Incident (渋谷事変編) story arcs in 5 and 18 episodes.[19]

Season 3

Immediately following the second season's finale, an anime sequel covering the Culling Game story arc was announced.[20][21] In August 2025, it was revealed that the sequel would be a third season, titled The Culling Game: Part 1 (死滅回游 前編), which premiered with a one-hour special featuring the first two episodes on January 9, 2026.[22][23][24] The season aired for 12 episodes, concluding with an extended 27-minute episode on March 27, 2026.[26]

Season 4

Immediately following the third season's finale, a fourth season, titled The Culling Game: Part 2 (死滅回游 後編), was announced.[28]

International release

Crunchyroll licensed the series for worldwide streaming outside of Asia.[29] Crunchyroll has released streaming dubs for the series in English, Spanish, Portuguese, French and German that premiered on November 20, 2020,[30][31] with the English dub also premiering on HBO Max on December 4, 2020.[32] Crunchyroll is also streaming the second season.[33] Viz Media released the first part of the first season on home video on February 28, 2023.[34][35][36] In Asia-Pacific, Medialink licensed the series and streamed it on iQIYI and Ani-One Asia's YouTube channel;[37][38] Ani-One Asia later streamed the series for their Ultra subscribers.[39] The company also released the series on Netflix in Southeast Asia, India, Hong Kong, and Taiwan on June 3, 2021.[40][41]

Feature-length compilations

A compilation feature version of Hidden Inventory / Premature Death premiered in Japanese theaters on May 30, 2025.[42][43][44]

A compilation film of the Shibuya Incident along the first two episodes of The Culling Game: Part 1 premiered in Japanese theaters on November 7, 2025.[22]

Popularity

In January 2021, it was revealed that Jujutsu Kaisen was the second most-watched anime series on Crunchyroll in 2020, only second to Black Clover, being watched in 71 countries and territories, including North America, South and Central America, Europe, Middle East and North Africa, Africa, Asia and Oceania.[56] The official music video of the series' first opening theme song, "Kaikai Kitan" by Eve, reached 100 million views on YouTube in April 2021, being one of the fastest anime openings to hit such number of views.[57]

On Tumblr's 2021 Year in Review, which highlights the largest communities, fandoms, and trends on the platform throughout the year, Jujutsu Kaisen ranked second behind My Hero Academia on the Top Anime & Manga Shows while Satoru Gojo was fifth on the Top Anime & Manga Characters category.[58] During the same year, the series became the second most discussed TV show worldwide on Twitter, surpassing Squid Game.[59] It placed nineteenth on the annual Twitter Japan's Trend Awards in 2021, based on the social network's top trending topics of the year.[60]

In 2024, Jujutsu Kaisen was named by the Guinness World Records and data-science firm Parrot Analytics as the "Most in-demand animated TV show", with a global demand rating 71.2 times than that of the average TV show, previously held by Attack on Titan. The demand of the series peaked on December 29 at 128 times the demand of the average show. It also had a higher percentage of Gen Z (ages 13–22) viewers with 71.3%, compared to 56.7% from One Piece and 64.4% from Attack on Titan.[61][62]

In April 2024, where according to the data compiled by the analyst Miles Atherton, Jujutsu Kaisen had the most social media engagement for the last 30 days in the top anime and network dramas in United States with 11.2 million, ahead of the other top shows including One Piece, Young Sheldon, and Grey's Anatomy.[63]

Critical reception

Micah Peters of The Ringer stated that while the series' focused execution of tropes rendered it infinitely watchable, its specificity, personality, and ultra-slick stylishness were what made it exceptional. He noted that, similar to director Sunghoo Park's previous work on The God of High School, the anime featured a sumptuous amount of splashy, expensive animation enabled by motion capture, which delivered on the action promised by the source material.[64] Paul Thomas Chapman of Otaku USA described the series as a prime example of average material elevated by excellent execution, drawing comparisons to Bleach and YuYu Hakusho. Chapman praised director Park's ability to seamlessly segue from goofy comedy to chilling horror and noted that the crew at MAPPA made this narrative mutability seem effortless.[65] Ana Diaz of Polygon highlighted the seventeenth episode, praising the series' treatment of its female characters as a departure from other series. Diaz wrote that the show presented a variety of female perspectives, allowing its young women to disagree and fight for their viewpoints. She concluded that its widespread success signaled that audiences were actively craving such change, giving other creators a green light to write diverse women into their shows.[66]

Reviewing the second season's Shibuya Incident Arc, Rafael Motamayor of IGN praised its animation but criticized its narrative as meandering. He described the relentless fight sequences as a slog, characterizing the arc as a series of nonsensical battles lacking emotional depth in the storytelling.[67] In a separate review, Beckett criticized the series for its handling of Nobara Kugisaki's apparent death, noting that the lack of known details about her character made the accompanying flashback ineffective. This was contrasted with the better-executed death of Kento Nanami. Beckett compared Nobara's fate to the "women in refrigerators" trope, arguing it served primarily to shock protagonist Yuji Itadori.[68] The shock surrounding Nobara's fate was echoed by The Television, which highlighted the dissonance created by her continued appearance in the ending sequence alongside the surviving characters.[69] In a general assessment of the season, Bolts of Anime News Network praised the backstory of Satoru Gojo and Suguru Geto but found the Shibuya arc mishandled its protagonist, Yuji Itadori, by portraying him more as a victim than an active participant.[70]

Accolades

The Jujutsu Kaisen anime was awarded "Anime of the Year" at the 5th Crunchyroll Anime Awards, while Ryomen Sukuna won the "Best Antagonist" category and "Lost in Paradise feat. Aklo" by ALI won the "Best Ending Sequence" category. In 2021, the series won the Character License Award at the Japan Character Awards by Japan's Character Brand Licensing Association (CBLA). It also won the Best TV Anime award at the 2021 Newtype Anime Awards, while Hiroshi Seko won Best Screenplay for his work on the series. The series ranked second in the anime category of the Yahoo! Japan Search Awards, based on the number of searches for a particular term compared to the year before.

In 2022, Jujutsu Kaisen won the Tokyo Anime Award for Animation of the Year in the television category. In 2023, the series became one of three recipients of the Special Achievement Award at the 65th Japan Record Awards. In 2024, it won the "Most In-Demand TV Series in the World 2023" and "Most In-Demand Anime Series of 2023" at the sixth Global Demand Awards. At the 8th Crunchyroll Anime Awards, the second season of the anime won eleven out of seventeen nominations including "Anime of the Year", which became the first to win multiple top prize.

Awards and nominations