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Crunchyroll

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Crunchyroll-logo-stacked

Logo as of July 2024 brand update announcement

Crunchyroll (クランチロール, Kuranchirōru) is an American subscription video on-demand over-the-top streaming service that specializes in the distribution, production and licensing of Japanese anime and (some) dorama. From 2013 to to 2023, it also provided some digital manga to subscribers. Crunchyroll was a subsidiary of AT&T's Otter Media, and from 2016 to 2018, the company partnered with Funimation, which would eventually merge into its brand in 2022 after Sony acquired Crunchyroll in 2021. The company is currently owned by Sony through a joint venture between Sony Pictures and Sony Music Entertainment Japan's Aniplex.

Crunchyroll has offices in California in San Francisco, Burbank, Culver City, & Los Angeles; in Texas in Dallas; Tokyo, New York City, Melbourne, Montreal, Paris, Roubaix, Lausanne, London, Berlin, Chișinău (?), and Coppell (?), and is a member of The Association of Japanese Animations (AJA). "Crunchyroll-Hime", also known as "Hime", is the official mascot of Crunchyroll.

Crunchyroll offers over 1,000 anime shows, more than 200 East Asian dramas to users, and previously around 80 manga titles as Crunchyroll Manga (discontinued for subscribers in December 2023), although not all programming is available worldwide due to licensing restrictions. Crunchyroll passed one million paid subscribers in February 2017, and has over 5 million paid subscribers as of 2021. Crunchyroll also releases titles on home video either directly or by having select anime titles released through its distribution partners (Aniplex of America, Sentai Filmworks, Viz Media, & Discotek Media in North America and Anime Limited in the United Kingdom).

After purchase by Sony, they have been scaling back non-anime offerings except for mobile games.

On February 7, 2024, Crunchyroll announced that it would be shutting down the Funimation app on April 2, 2024. Funimation subscriptions will be automatically transferred to Crunchyroll, but details and process may vary depending on specific payment platform, subscription type, and region.

History[]

It started as an American website and international online community focused on streaming East Asian media including anime, manga, and electronic entertainment. Founded in 2006 by a group of University of California, Berkeley, graduates,[1] Crunchyroll's distribution channel and partnership program delivers content to over 100 million registered users worldwide.

On October 31, 2013, it launched its Crunchyroll Manga digital manga platform.[2] It would be discontinued in December 2023.

In early December 2013, Chernin Group acquired a majority stake in Crunchyroll.[3]

In early September 2016, Crunchyroll and Funimation announced a partnership to share content via streaming, dub production, and home video products.[4] A couple years later in October 2018, they decided to end the partnership.[5]

At the end of 2019, Crunchyroll became the majority owner of Viz Media Europe and was called Crunchyroll EMEA internally. In January 2020, it officially changed its corporate name to Crunchyroll EMEA and announced the change in April 2020.

In late December 2020, Sony (who owns Funimation) had announced it had acquired Crunchyroll from AT&T (via subsidiary WarnerMedia) for just under $1.2 billion.[6] However the acquisition was delayed by an extension of a U.S. Department of Justice anti-trust investigation.[7]

On August 9, 2021, it was announced that Sony had completed its acquisition of Crunchyroll.[8]

On March 1, 2022, it was announced that the Funimation catalog (along with VRV and Wakanim) would be merging into Crunchyroll and implying anime availability on those other services would effectively end.[9]

On March 24, 2022, Crunchyroll announced that Sentai Filmworks licensed anime would be leaving on March 31. Sentai Filmworks licensed their anime to Funimation, but apparently decided to end the license once Funimation was merged into Crunchyroll. Sentai Filmworks anime will still be available for streaming on the HIDIVE service.

On March 26, 2022, it was reported that Crunchyroll would be ending ad-supported, free viewing for all new seasonal anime starting in the Spring 2022 season (roughly late March).[10][11] This includes new episodes of continuing series.[10] Spring 2022 anime will allow free viewing a week after the anime episode premieres for the first 3 episodes of the series as long as it happens before May 31, 2022.[10] The trend ending ad-supported, free viewing is likely to extend to all its catalog at some point.

On August 4, 2022, Crunchtroll announced it had purchased the anime goods retailer Right Stuf.

In September 2022, ANN noticed several older titles which had been available as ad-supported, free viewing became premium-only, so in response, Crunchyroll (unhelpfully) updated their advertising video-on-demand (AVOD) policy.[12]

On April 3, 2023, VRV was merged into Crunchyroll.[13]

News-yuzu isolated final-1

Yuzu

On June 20, 2023, they unveiled a new format for their website main page.[14] They also unveiled an avatar for their Crunchyroll Official byline, "Yuzu".

On September 22, 2023, Crunchyroll revealed its plans to phase of Right Stuf as a separate site with its products migrating to the Crunchyroll Store by October 10.

On November 7, 2023, Crunchyroll launched a mobile game availability called "Game Vault", but only to subscribers of the top 2 tiers of their plans, "Mega" and "Ultimate Fan".[15]

On November 10, 2023, Crunchyroll confirmed it would be ending its Manga App on mobile and web on December 11, 2023, ultimately ending digital manga availability as part of its subscription plans.[16] It pointed its users to purchasing manga via its updated Crunchyroll Store.

On December 9, 2023, Manga UP! confirmed that it is working on adding the Square Enix titles that Crunchyroll Manga previously released on its service.[17]

On May 23, 2024, Sony held a brie meeting with the press where it was revealed that Crunchyroll had grown its subscriber base to 13 million.[18]

On August 7, 2024, Crunchyroll announced the number of paying subscribers had surpassed 15 million, over 50,000 episodes, and over 25,000 hours of content.[19]

Crunchyroll Anime Awards[]

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The Crunchyroll Anime Awards are awards given annually by the anime streaming service Crunchyroll to recognize the best anime of the previous year. Announced in December 2016, the awards were first presented in January 2017.[20] The first award results event called the Crunchyroll Anime Awards Party was held in San Francisco on January 28, 2017.[20] Crunchyroll describes it as a "global event <that> recognizes the anime shows, characters, and artists that fans around the world love most."

On April 16, 2023, Crunchyroll announced it would be moving the live presentation event to Japan at the Grand Prince Hotel New Takanawa, Minato City, Tokyo.[21]

Crunchyroll Expo[]

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A few months after the announcement of the Anime Awards were announced, the Crunchyroll Expo convention was announced to take place from August 25-27, 2017 at the Santa Clara Convention Center in Santa Clara, CA.[22][23]

In 2018, the convention moved to the San Jose McEnery Convention Center in San Jose, CA.[24]

Crunchyroll EMEA[]

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Crunchyroll EMEA is composed of 2 subsidiaries: Crunchyroll SAS & Crunchyroll SA (Crunchyroll GmbH is a sub-subsidiary).

  • Crunchyroll SAS
    Crunchyroll SAS, formerly known as Viz Media Europe, is the French subsidiary of Crunchyroll, housing the French-language operations of the company, including Kazé France and Anime Digital Network.
  • Crunchyroll SA
    Crunchyroll SA, formerly known as Viz Media Switzerland, is the Swiss subsidiary of Crunchyroll, housing the German-language operations of the company, including Kazé Germany, Eye See Movies, Crunchyroll GmbH, and the defunct Anime on Demand.
    • Crunchyroll GmbH
      Crunchyroll GmbH, formerly known as AV Visionen GmbH, is the German subsidiary of Crunchyroll SA, and is responsible for distributing anime, manga and films in German-speaking territories under the Kazé and Crunchyroll labels as well as German television and films in Germany though its Eye See Movies label. It is also the distributor for Anime House, Nipponart, Hardball Films, Film Confect Anime, and Polyband Anime as well as for Aniplex's Peppermint Anime, and manga of the independent labels MangaCult and Manga Jam Session.

Crunchyroll Originals[]

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Crunchyroll Originals is a sort of brand or label that are a mix of animated features that are either co-produced or directly produced by the company. Most are co-produced and animated by Japanese studios, but some are animated by their in-house Crunchyroll Studios.

Partner animation studios through Spring 2022:

Crunchyroll Studios[]

As mentioned above, some Crunchyroll Originals are animated in-house by Crunchyroll Studios. Reception has been slightly negative to very negative, but partly due to significant stylistic differences from most anime. So far, most of the Crunchyroll Studios shows have had a more American cartoon look which contrasts to most of the co-produced works.

Works as of Spring 2022:

  • Onyx Equinox (2020)
  • High Guardian Spice (2021)
  • FreakAngels (2022)
  • Meiji Gekken: Swords & Guns (TBA)

Crunchyroll Store[]

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The Crunchyroll Store is an online retail point of sale for anime merchandise including Crunchyroll exclusives. As of October 2023, it should include inventory of what formerly appeared on the side Right Stuf which was purchased in August 2022.

Crunchyroll 24/7 free channel[]

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On October 11, 2023, it was announced that there would be a 24 hour/7 days a week free anime channel by Crunchyroll on some limited outlets like Amazon Freevee, LG Channels (available on LG Smart TVs), The Roku Channel, and VIZIO WatchFree+[25][26] However, no evidence of this new channel is mentioned on the Amazon Freevee webpage, so it may only be visible in apps or devices.

Media[]

Images[]

Brand refresh announced July 2024
Old logos

Notes[]

  • Their official slogan was "The Official Source for Anime & Drama".[citation needed]
  • Crunchyroll was one of the initial channels available at launch (announced June 14, 2016) for the umbrella service, VRV.

References[]

  1. ↑ ICV2 - CRUNCHYROLL CEO: MAKING ONLINE ANIME PAY (Interview with Kun Gao, Part 1) by ICv2 on December 14, 2008 @ 11:46 pm CT
  2. ↑ Anime News Network - Crunchyroll Launches “Crunchyroll Manga” Digital Comic Platform Oct 31st 2013
  3. ↑ Anime News Network - Chernin Group Purchases Majority Stake in Crunchyroll by Crystalyn Hodgkins 2013-12-02 18:07 EST
  4. ↑ Anime News Network - Crunchyroll, Funimation Announce Partnership to Share Content Via Streaming, Home Video, EST by Crystalyn Hodgkins 2016-09-08 15:00 EDT
  5. ↑ Anime News Network - Funimation, Crunchyroll End Content-Sharing Partnership (Update) by Karen Ressler 2018-10-18 13:58 EDT
  6. ↑ The Verge - Sony is buying anime streaming service Crunchyroll from AT&T for $1.175 billion By Jay Peters Dec 9, 2020, 7:26pm EST
  7. ↑ The Information - Sony’s Hopes of Countering Netflix in Anime Market Delayed by Antitrust Probe By Josh Sisco and Jessica Toonkel March 24, 2021 9:35 AM PDT
  8. ↑ Sony Pictures - Sony’s Funimation Global Group Completes Acquisition of Crunchyroll from AT&T August 9, 2021
  9. ↑ Crunchyroll News - Funimation Content Moving to Crunchyroll for World’s Largest Anime Library by Crunchyroll Official March 01, 2022 6:00am PST
  10. ↑ 10.0 10.1 10.2 Crunchyroll Help - Changes to Ad-Supported Viewing by Brett 24-Mar-2022
  11. ↑ Anime News Network - Crunchyroll to Halt Ad-Supported Streaming Starting With Spring 2022 Season by Adriana Hazra 2022-03-26 10:15 EDT
  12. ↑ Anime News Network - Crunchyroll Updates Statement on Advertising VOD Policy by Alex Mateo 2022-09-23 16:30 EDT
  13. ↑ Anime News Network - VRV Streaming Service Bundle Merges With Crunchyroll by Rafael Antonio Pineda 2023-04-05 00:02 EDT
  14. ↑ Crunchyroll News - Welcome to the New Crunchyroll News Experience! by Crunchyroll Official Jun 20, 2023 7:00 AM PDT
  15. ↑ Variety - Crunchyroll Launches Free Games for Upper-Tier Subscribers, Taking a Page From Netflix’s Playbook By Todd Spangler Nov 7, 2023 9:00am PT
  16. ↑ Anime News Network - Crunchyroll Ends Digital Manga App on Mobile, Web on December 11 by Adriana Hazra 2023-11-11 02:46 EST
  17. ↑ Anime News Network - Manga UP! to Add Square Enix Manga Previously Hosted on Crunchyroll by Crystalyn Hodgkins 2023-12-09 18:05 EST
  18. ↑ Crazy for Anime Trivia - Crunchyroll Reaches 13 Million Subscribers by Crazy May 23, 2024
  19. ↑ Crunchyroll News - Crunchyroll Officially Surpasses 15 Million Subscribers by Crunchyroll Official Aug 7, 2024 6:00 AM PDT
  20. ↑ 20.0 20.1 Crunchyroll News - [1] by Guest Author Dec 20, 2016 8:25 AM PST
  21. ↑ Crunchyroll News - Crunchyroll to Expand Anime Awards and Bring the Live Event to Japan in 2023 by Crunchyroll Official Aug 16, 2022 6:00 AM PDT
  22. ↑ Crunchyroll News - Largest Anime Streaming Service Crunchyroll Announces Its First Convention Press Release February 09, 2017 7:50am PST
  23. ↑ Variety - Crunchyroll Anime Service Tops 1 Million Paid Subscribers by Todd Spangler Feb 9, 2017 8:05am PT
  24. ↑ Crunchyroll News - Crunchyroll Announces Dates and Location for Crunchyroll Expo 2018! by Patrick Macias Feb 2, 2018 7:31 AM PST
  25. ↑ Crunchyroll News - Crunchyroll Launches 24/7 Anime Channel in the US by Guest Author Oct 11, 2023 6:00 AM PDT
  26. ↑ Anime News Network - Crunchyroll Launches New 24/7 Linear Channel by Alex Mateo 2023-10-11 10:04 EDT

External links[]

Crunchyroll-specific info
Social media
Other info
Anime Awards

News[]

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