SINGAPORE – Being an anime fan used to be uncool, according to Ms Sheila Tan, who has been a fan of the genre since she was nine.

But lately, the 25-year-old wedding planner has been noticing more and more people attending big anime festivals here, such as Anime Festival Asia (AFA).

“The crowd is around 30 per cent bigger now compared with pre-pandemic levels,” she said. “There was a stigma where if you liked anime, you were seen as ‘cringe’. It definitely still exists, but there’s less of it now.”

“Even my mum knows about Demon Slayer,” she added, referring to the hit anime that has made waves.

Once considered by some to be a subculture of popular media, anime has recently stolen the limelight in mainstream entertainment.

Demon Slayer: Kimetsu no Yaiba Infinity Castle, which premiered on Aug 14 here and is currently showing in cinemas, became the first Japanese anime film to pass US$600 million (S$773 million) at the worldwide box office as of Sept 29, according to Sony Pictures Entertainment, which distributed the movie internationally.

The series is a historical fantasy set in Japan and follows an adolescent boy’s search for a cure for his sister, who has turned into a demon.

In contrast, Marvel’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps film – which was released on July 24 here – grossed about US$520 million worldwide, according to a Sept 27 article by entertainment website Screen Rant.

Anime has been increasing in popularity over the last 10 to 15 years, with a spike after the Covid-19 pandemic, observers told The Straits Times.

Programmes from the genre were viewed over one billion times on Netflix in 2024, with viewership tripling over the last five years, the streaming service said. Thirty-three anime titles appeared in its Global Top 10 (Non-English) list – more than double the number of titles from 2021.

Businesses that sell anime-related products ...