Japan’s 2026 “Next Big Manga” List Is Out — And You Already Know These Creators

Every year Japan runs a fan-voted award built around a single question: which manga is about to blow up? It’s called the Tsugi ni Kuru Manga Taishō — the Next Manga Award — and past winners include My Hero Academia, Spy × Family, Oshi no Ko, and Kaiju No. 8, all before their anime.

The 2026 nominee list is out. It’s 100 titles long, and almost none of it has been covered in English.

Here’s the part that got our attention. Scroll the author column and you start hitting names you already know. The creators of Gintama, Karakuri Circus, Bloom Into You, and Teasing Master Takagi-san all have new series sitting on this list — and most fans outside Japan have no idea they exist.

Quick answer

The 2026 Next Manga Award nominated 100 series: 40 in the print Comics division and 60 in the Web Manga division. Voting ran June 26 to July 13, and the winners are announced September 16, 2026. Several nominees are brand-new work from creators with large overseas followings. Four of them are below.

1. 2-nen B-gumi Yuusha Destroyers — from the creator of Gintama

Hideaki Sorachi‘s first new serialization since Gintama wrapped in 2019 — about a seven-year gap — began in Weekly Shonen Jump in April 2026.

It’s a comedy again. Valaris III inherits the will of a Demon King who was killed by a hero, and ends up at a modern Japanese high school next to a student who just wants a quiet life but happens to be the strongest fighter around, stuck with the nickname “Toilet Demon King.”

If you put years into Gintama, that setup probably tells you everything.

2. Silver Mountain — from the creator of Ushio and Tora and Karakuri Circus

Kazuhiro Fujita launched Silver Mountain in Weekly Shonen Sunday in May 2026. It’s a martial arts fantasy that opens with a child spirited away by tengu, describing the realm he saw, and builds into a climb toward the peak of a world crawling with monsters.

Four volumes were out as of May 2026 — early enough to get in at the start, late enough that there’s something to binge.

3. Kimi wa Shuumatsu — from the creator of Bloom Into You

Nio Nakatani followed Bloom Into You and Kamisama ga Machigaeru with Kimi wa Shuumatsu, running in Dengeki Daioh since the November 2025 issue.

Comic Natalie framed it as a fantasy romantic comedy built around an otherworldly girl who is, quite literally, a threat to the world. For readers who came to Nakatani through Bloom Into You’s quiet, precise character work, that’s a real genre swing.

4. Mane Mane Nichinichi — from the creator of Teasing Master Takagi-san

Souichirou Yamamoto has a slice-of-life in Gessan about three first-year girls managing a high school baseball team. No teasing hook, no rivalry — just the day-to-day of the people who keep a sports club running.

If what you liked about Takagi-san was the rhythm rather than the romance, this is aimed right at that.

Why this list is worth watching

The Next Manga Award isn’t a critics’ panel. Readers recommend titles, a committee turns those into a nominee list, and then readers vote. It measures momentum, not sales.

The hit rate is why people pay attention: by the award’s own count, as of 2018, 9 of the 18 top-three finishers had already received anime adaptations. We broke down how the award works and its full track record here → [What Is Japan’s Next Manga Award?]

The Japan perspective

There’s a structural reason veterans show up next to complete unknowns. To qualify for 2026, a series needed five volumes or fewer as of May 13, 2026, or a serialization start date on or after January 1, 2025. It’s an award for early-stage work by design.

So when a veteran launches something new, they land in the same pool as a web manga nobody has heard of yet. That’s also what makes this list a better discovery tool than a bestseller chart. Bestseller charts tell you what already won. This tells you what readers in Japan are betting on. Among Japanese manga readers, a nomination reads more as “worth checking early” than as a prestige stamp.

Who this is for

• People who follow creators, not franchises.
• Readers who’d rather start at volume 1 than jump in at volume 30.
• Fans trying to spot adaptation candidates before the announcements.

What happens next

Voting closed July 13, 2026. Winners in both divisions are announced September 16, 2026, and we’ll cover the results.

Where to read these

All four are Japanese-language releases running in Japanese magazines and manga services. At the time of writing we could not confirm official English editions for them — if that changes, we’ll update this page. When you go looking, stick to official publisher pages and licensed services. We don’t link to piracy, and you shouldn’t use it.

FAQ

Is this an official industry award? It’s run by KADOKAWA-affiliated companies (Niconico and Da Vinci) but decided by public vote.

Does a nomination mean an anime is coming? No. Historically correlated, never guaranteed.

Where’s the full list? All 100 nominees are on the official site, tsugimanga.jp.