Summary
Why design one love interest when multiple ones will do? That’s how the harem genre was formed, as it kept readers and audiences guessing over which potential lover the protagonist would eventually pair off with. It popped up in the 1970s but blew up in subsequent decades with the rise of classic anime likeUrusei YatsuraandTenchi Muyo.
The genre is still around today, whether it puts a guy among girls likeHigh School DxD, a girl among guys likeOuran High School Host Club,or has an LGBTQ twist likeIono-sama. While those all made it into animation though, others didn’t make the jump. In fact, there are plenty of greatharem mangathat haven’t been animated yet.
Updated on Jun 27, 2025, by David Heath:It’s usually the best and brightest harem manga that end up getting animated, or at least the most popular ones anyway.Chitose is in the Ramune Bottlekind of fell off in public perception after 2022, but will be making its anime debut in July 2025, where it may find fortune again. It’ll also mean it’ll graduate from this list likeThe 100 GirlfriendsandTying the Knot with an Amagami Sisterbefore it.
This list has included a few reverse-harem stories in the past, so for this update, all of its new entries will be reverse-harem manga, where one girl ends up surrounded by hot guys to capture her fancy. It’s a formula that’s worked forFruits BasketandFushigi Yugi, though time will only tell if it’ll also lead to these new entries getting the anime nod someday.
35Tensei Kenja wa Musume to Kurasu
Salaryman Gets Reborn in Another World with Built-in Cheats
Not to be confused with the similarly titledTensei Kenja no Isekai Life, which did get adapted into an anime asMy Isekai Life,Tensei Kenja wa Musume to Kurasu(The Reborn Sage Lives With His Daughters) is its non-union, harem-based equivalent. The premises are nearly identical; onlyTKnIL’s Yuji was sucked into a computer world.TKwMtK’s Kento actually dies, yet both end up stronger than they expected.
In his old life, Kento was a salaryman who was literally worked to death by vile bosses. As his life ebbed away, he came across a god called Raidel, who offered him a new life. Though skeptical, Kento requested to live a slow life with just a house and a knack for farming. He seemingly gets that when he’s sent to a medieval era, but he soon discovers he’s got magic powers and other ‘cheats’, which soon catches the attention of the locals. His slow life is about to speed up and earn him some followers.
34Chitose Is In The Ramune Bottle
Popular Guy Uses His Charm to Help Shut-In Find Girls
Starting life as a light novel by Hiromu and raemz,Chitose is in the Ramune Bottlehas been running inManga UP!since April 2020. Itcaught on so wellthat the city of Fukui set aside ¥6 million for aChitose-based tourism campaign in the middle of 2022. Both the light novel and manga are available in English via Yen Press, though the light novel has kept up its momentum better as the manga’s MAL score has really fallen over the years. Either way, it’ll soon graduate from this list, as it’ll receive an anime adaptation in 2025.
Nonetheless, both are about Saku Chitose, the most popular kid at Fuji High School. Everything seems to be going perfectly for him until his teacher asks him to help a shut-in student called Kenta Yamazaki break out of his shell. He uses his connections and social knowledge to help Kenta get on in school. In other words, it’s like theNerd & Jockwebcomic with a narrative and a bunch of women to charm.
3329 And JK
Office Worker Ends Up as a Mentor to His Boss' Granddaughter
29 and JKbegan as a light novel until it was adapted into a manga forGangan Online. The title has a worrying implication, as the lead male, Eiji, is 29 years old, and the leading lady, Karen, is the titular JK, or joshi kōsei (high school girl). Luckily, it sets out to keep things between the two platonic. They met in a manga café during his break from his call center work, where they spoke and he encouraged her ambitions to become a writer.
Eiji thought that’s where things would begin and end with her. However, he learns Karen is the granddaughter of his boss, who encourages Eiji to mentor her. That would be simple enough, but things only get complicated from there. His work gets busier, his sister moves in with him, and his childhood friend comes back into his life. Between his stresses and suitors, helping Karen with her writing may be the only peace he’ll get.
32You Guys Are All Annoying!
Teacher Gets Pestered By 3 Girls
After being translated by fans in multiple ways, be it “You Are All Annoying” or “All of Them Are Troublesome Girls”, the Japanese harem manga ‘Omaera Zenin Mendokusai’ is now officially known asYou Guys Are All Annoyingvia its digital Mangamo translation. It’s a fitting title, as it shows how Kunihiko Kunitachi is driven up the wall by the girls at his school. He works as a language and art teacher and often has trouble with Kazumi Kazumiya, one of his students.
When he suggests she make some friends, she asks him to be her first friend. He agrees, but only for Kazumi to end up following him everywhere. Even when he tries to introduce her to new people, like Riho Kurihara and Eiko Enomoto, he only makes things more complicated. Surprisingly, while the manga hasn’t been animated, it did get a live-action movie in 2019 with Kensho Ono (Giorno Giovanna’s VA inJojo’s Bizarre Adventure) as Kunihiko.
31Oukoku e Tsuzuku Michi: Dorei Kenshi no Nariagari Harem Life
Ex-Slave Turned Hero Aims to Make a Kingdom of His Own
Most of the entries on this list have been cheeky or sensual at most, with many manga being more on the sweet and romantic side.Oukoku e Tsuzuku Michi: Dorei Kenshi no Nariagari Harem Life(Road to the Kingdom: The Enslaved Gladiator’s Jumped-Up Harem Life) goes into more adult territory, as an enslaved warrior named Aegir escapes the arena to join a band of mercenaries. Things go south for him when they’re all killed by a vampire named Lucy.
Aegir would be next on the chopping block, but Lucy instead takes him into her castle and instructs him in the ways of the world, literally and figuratively. Two years later, Aegir and Lucy make a mutual promise: if he can turn the land around Erg Forest into a kingdom, she’ll become his woman. So he sets off on his quest to do so. The manga cover suggests the fantasy is limited to the setting, but the covers of the original light novels reveal Aegir is conquering more than just huge tracts of land, as Lucy is just one of many intrigued by his charms.
30Reiji Yonakano’s Harem
Ghost Helps Antisocial Kid Find a Girlfriend
Perhaps better known under its Japanese titleYonakano Reiji ni Harem wo,or asMidnight Harem(because “Yonakano” means “at midnight”. It’s a pun that doesn’t quite survive translation),Reiji Yonakano’s Haremis a rom-com with a spooky edge as Reiji, an ordinary school kid, manages to meet his “fated person,” who just happens to be a ghost. Invisible to most other people, Rei makes it her (un)life’s mission to help Reiji find a girlfriend.
The problem is that he isn’t interested in romance, or even socializing. But whether it’s his shy classmate Yomi, or Minori the Public Moral Chief, Rei won’t stop until she’s found Reiji the perfect partner, or partners if need be. It’s a unique premise told with plenty of charm that makes it a genuine hidden gem, as it’s also a scanslation-only treat for readers outside Japan.
29Magika Swordsman And Summoner
Underachieving Male Summoner Aims to Prove His Worth
Magika Swordsman and Summonerstarted as a light novel under its original Japanese name ‘Magika no Kenshi to Shōkan Basileus’. Then Lin Meng adapted it into a manga forComic Alive. In its world, people discovered magic and the ability to summon mythical beings. The world decides to form pacts with these beings where they get to choose a trainee as their official Summoner, who’ll work in tandem with a Swordsman.
Then, nearly a decade and a half later, things get complicated. Kazuki gets chosen as a summoner, despite the position usually going to women due to them having more mana. As such, he sticks out at the all-girls summoner school. He’s bottom of the class, and his elder foster sister, Kanae, thinks he’d be better off as a Swordsman. But Kazuki is determined to live up to the Summoner role and prove everyone wrong.
28The Death Mage
Boy Reborn as Dhampir Raises his Harem from the Dead
On the surface,The Death Mageis more like an isekai with a twist, as its lead hasn’t just died once, he’s died three times and isn’t keen on doing it a fourth. As a high schooler named Hiroto, he died in a terrorist attack with his classmates. As test subject D-01, he was tortured and experimented on, and the scientists discovered he had the uncanny ability to zombify himself until he was gunned down.
Now, as the dhampir Vandalieu, he’s found a loving home with his mother, the dark elf Darcia. When she’s executed for birthing him, he snaps. He’s had enough of his many lifetimes of bad luck. Using the “death attribute” he heard about in his old life, he raises an army of the dead to ensure he lives happily ever after. Some of those revived dead vie for his affections, like the battle maids Rita and Saria, and his accidental fiancées Privel, Gizania, and Myuze, among others.
27Dragons Rioting
Boy Must Keep His Cool Among Strong Women to Stay Alive
While the entries on this list largely keep things clean, some of them do come close to the line between mature storytelling and mature content.Dragons Riotingkeeps things PG, or at least PG-13 with its premise. Rintaro was diagnosed with a condition where he could die if he got aroused. To help him overcome this, his father took him to the mountains to teach him how to keep cool under the collar, so to speak.
At 16, he enrolled in Nangokuren School, thinking it was the largest all-boys school in the country. Unfortunately, he finds out the hard way that it was the largest all-girls school that recently went co-ed. He tries to transfer out, only to get the attention of the Dragons-three notorious female students who run the school’s biggest factions. While he befriends Ayane, the other two, Kyōka and Rino, aren’t so amiable. They want to be the strongest students, and Rintaro’s only hope is to prove his mettle against them while keeping his composure.
26Sekai no Owari no Encore
Fake Hero Proves He’s the Real Deal with His Party of Women
Sekai no Owari no Encore, a fantasy harem adventure, was originally a light novel by Kei Sazane and Haruaki Fuyuno. Then it was converted into a manga by Ryū Usui forComics Alive. Surprisingly, for a modern fantasy tale,it’s not an isekai. Instead, it involves a mystical MacGuffin known as the ‘Encore’. It was the last record of the end of the old world and the rebirth of the new one, and it was last seen in the hands of the legendary hero Elline.
Ren, a young boy with a striking resemblance to Elline, aims to become a heroic knight like him. Unfortunately, he’s so hopeless with a sword that the locals call him a ‘fake hero’. Nonetheless, when Kylse the Dragon Princess awakens from her seal, she sees potential in Ren. Alongside the archangel Fear, and Elise the Demon-Lord, they form a party to find the Encore together. With friends like them, who needs foes?
