The Cultural Shift: Manga’s Surprising Domination of Western Comic Sales
Not even DC or Marvel can stop this force. Manga has seen a massive rise in popularity over the last few years outselling the western comic book market.
To my fellow fans of graphic novels who are reading this, let me ask you a question. When was the last time you picked up a physical copy of a western comic and read it? Now when was the last time you did the same with manga? One is significantly more collected than the other and it isn’t the one that you might traditionally presume.
For fans of graphic novels, there are now two major divisions competing in the western market: western comics (mainly those published by DC and Marvel) and Japanese manga. The term ‘manga’ in Japan is used to refer to the act of drawing, however in the west it is known as a variant of graphic novels that are created in Japan. This unique medium has seen a massive boom in the UK since the start of the pandemic. According to NielsenIQ BookScan, in 2019 there were 983,822 copies of the genre sold equating to a value of £9.1m. By 2022, this number jumped immensely to 1.8m copies sold that year nearly doubling the sales of 3 years prior
In comparison, 2001 saw only £736 spent in the manga category proving just how immense the shift has been. This popularity has consistently risen since as so far in 2025, manga was the biggest subcategory in the graphic novels genre - accounting for 56.9% of all graphic novel sales and amassing £17.7m in value before the year has even ended.
The grip that manga has on the graphic novels market now is immense and I will admit that I am not immune to this force. Even though I tend to have a preference for DC stories and franchises, I find myself collecting more manga than I do DC comics. NielsenIQ BookData published the top 60 bestselling graphic novels of 2025 so far with the top 10 being made up entirely of manga. In fact, the first western comic to appear in the list is placed 28th being Deadpool Kills the Marvel Universe Omnibus by Cullen Bunn. The list contains only 1 entry from Marvel, 2 from DC and 1 independent comic published by Penguin, that being the infamous MAUS. Otherwise, every other 56 entries on the list is manga showing just how well-loved this medium is now.
To find out why manga has been popping off so much, let’s compare the number one best selling graphic novel within each major publishing group in the genre (DC comics, Marvel and Viz Media) between 2020 and 2025 and see how they’ve been performing against each other.
Although it is clear that Marvel is out of the race, DC struggles to catch up with the pace of which manga is growing at. In 2020, the numbers were still quite close however manga skyrocketed to the top the following year reaching sales of over £100,000 showing they are a strong competitor within the genre but why does this occur?
Manga sells through its adaptations
One of the answers as to why this happens is to do with adaptations. Manga is regularly adapted into television shows in Japan known as ‘anime’ and it is a lot more common for a manga to become adapted than for a graphic novel to be adapted since anime has become its own medium of animation. Through this, if an anime becomes big then the manga will subsequently sell. The best selling manga in 2022 was Chainsaw Man Volume.1 due to the anime adaptation of the same name airing that same year despite the manga being released in 2018. Adaptations are proven to work for DC as well since their best selling comic in 2022 was The Sandman Volume.1 following the release of the series adaptation on Netflix of the same name allowing the book to hit the £150,000 mark despite the original comic being published in 1989.
Manga offers more affordable prices
Viz Media’s books are consistently priced under £10 making the price point very accessible to new readers. On the other hand, DC and Marvel price their comics between the £15-£20 range implying a more premium feel. The main audience that engages with graphic novels in the UK are aged between 13-24. Due to this, many of these readers will either have a low income or are still financially dependent on their parents making the DC and Marvel price point unappealing not only to the reader but to the parent as well.
Manga offers a lower entry barrier
Manga is a lot simpler to collect since volumes go in order (i.e. volume 1 then 2 then 3 and so forth) often following one consistent narrative. On the other hand, comics release in small issues which can be hard to access to the average person especially if one doesn’t have a comic book shop near them whereas manga nowadays can be found in your average bookstore. An established ‘canon’ tends to be rare within comics causing the narrative to be all over the place. If we take the character of Batman for example, Batman has starred in 8,436 comics and that includes alternate universes, rebooted narratives and brand new storylines with characters that the reader is assumed to know of beforehand. Even if a reader engaged with a guide, this could still be too daunting, making the world of comics complicated when compared to the linear storytelling of manga.
Everyone is familiar with the characters Spiderman and Batman, however within the next few years everyone will be aware of the names Luffy D. Monkey and Tanjiro Kamado as the medium is expected to reach a global market size of USD 23,994.6m by 2030.
Really solid analysis of the market shift here. The point about entrybarriers is especially crucial because it's not just affordability but cognitive load. Western comics expect readers to juggle multiverse timelines and decades of continuity, while manga just says "start here." Makes me wonder if DC and Marvel could actually adopt a more streamlined release model without sacrificing their IP value.