There’s nothing better than a good romance anime. The best ones will make you laugh, cry, and feel all kinds of feelings. They’ll make you fall in love with the characters and the story, and you’ll be searching for the next best romance anime to watch. If you’re in the mood for a good romance, there is no shortage of anime series to choose from.
However, if you are looking for the best romance anime of all time, you have come to the right place. After watching and reviewing hundreds of romance anime for years, we bring you the 20+ best romance anime of all time.
Here are the 22 best romance anime of all time
The best romance anime are the ones that make you feel all the feelings but also make you think and feel deeply too. Whether you’re looking for a funny rom-com, sad anime, or wholesome romance anime, there is something for everyone on this list.
Whether it’s for the quality of writing, the interactions between the characters, or the emotional impact, these animes have left an impression on viewers and are considered to be the best romance anime of all time. Here are our top picks.
22. Spice and Wolf
If you’re an anime fan then chances are you know about plenty of wolf girls. Come on, there’s at least one wolf girl in every fantasy in me these days, but Spice and Wolf is a bit of an old show that got released in 2008 and played the wolf girl trope really well. Here we have a powerful wolf deity named Holo who has turned into just a myth and no longer gets the respect she wanted from the villages.
So, when a merchant named Kraft Lawrence lands in the village, she makes a deal with him to take her to the northern home Yoitsu in return to helping him with his business. Kraft realizes Holo’s skill in evaluating a person and decides to accept her offer.
Unlike many other romance anime, this has tons and tons of dialogue and even has a bit of economics pushed in. There won’t be a wolf girl to help you manage your business, but if you need to learn some merchant trading with a couple with great chemistry, this is the show for you.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 2(25 Ep.)
21. Familiar of Zero
Familiar of zero starts off as your regular isekai anime before giving some heavy emotional moments at the end of each season. It starts off when a guy from our world gets transported to a world full of nobles and aristocrats.
The girl who summoned her is Louise and since she has no pet, she wants him to become her pet. Yes, this involves a lot of submission and domination tropes, but at the end of each season, every plot point of the show accumulates to something major and gives us a hard-hitting final arc.
Unlike other anime, Familiar of Zero also has a lot of childish comedic moments that sometimes will be boring for some people but stick around and you’ll get a great romance anime.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 4(49 Ep.)
20. Wotakoi: Love is Hard for Otaku
The thing I love the most about Wotakoi is its adult cast. Come on, I’ve had enough romance anime with high schoolers and it’s time we brought some adults to the show. The main themes the show discusses are also related to a lot of adults. It speaks about job pressure, peer pressure, dating life, the otaku culture, and keeping your desires hidden just to bond with your work group.
It follows the energetic Narumi Momose, secretly an otaku and a fujoshi. Who is a fujoshi? They are the female fans in the anime fandom that love Yaoi. Narumi meets an old middle school friend, Hirotaka Nifuji, who knows she’s an otaku.
The two go to have a drink to remember the old times and soon they agree to start dating since they’re both otakus. Wotakoi also makes the two characters a couple in the first episode, so you don’t have to wait several light-years to see your ship turn cannon.
Dubbed – No
Season – 1(11 Ep.)
19. Blue Spring Ride
Here’s another one of those anime that likes to add colors to its title. Blue Spring Ride features a girl who has built up a fake personality to keep guys away from her while still remembering about a boy she had a crush on and surprise-surprise, the boy comes to her school.
Now, our girl Futaba has to decide whether to date him or to stick to her no boys in my life personality. Blue Spring Ride has a lot of Shoujo cliches that you might already be familiar with if you are a Shoujo fan.
Still, it has a way of interconnecting these characters with different personalities to a bigger story. Of course, you get the good old misunderstandings and love triangles, so like I said, be ready for some cliches.
Dubbed – No
Season – 1(12 Ep.)
18. My Little Monster
My little monster is the best romance anime to watch if you want to see how two characters with completely different personalities get together.
On one side, you’ve got the apathetic Shizuku Mizutani who only cares about her grades. On the other side, you have Haru Yoshida, a violent troublemaker who gets into a fight with everyone in the class, but what do these two have in common?
Well, both of them don’t have any friends and what’s even better is that Haru straight-up confesses to Shizuku after getting to know her and kisses her in the first episode itself. Thank you, finally a romance anime that goes for the kiss without making us wait 12 episodes. You know what, people should learn from this anime like this.
Dubbed – No
Season – 1(13 Ep.)
17. Orange
Romance and time travel when was the last time you saw these two together in one. Orange is a show that combines these two genres to create a unique high school romance anime that throws around those love triangles, rejection, and the good old confessions. The anime also has a lot of sad moments, so make sure to take a tissue box along with you.
Orange follows Naho Takamiya, a girl who gets a letter from a future self that says the boy in their school named Kakeru Naruse will die unless Naho does something about it.
Now our girl Naho must rethink all her decisions involving Kakeru because if she makes one wrong decision then it will be your average visual novel bad ending. Sometimes Orange feels a bit over-dramatized and melodramatic, but it heightens issues like depression really well.
Kakeru is also one of the most realistic characters I’ve seen in romance anime. Seriously this guy is better for a TV show like 13 Reasons Why.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(13 Ep.)
16. Plastic Memory
Right after Orange, we got another sad anime and this involves robots. No, not the kind that stays forever, the kind that expires and dies after giving you a heartbreak. The robots here are called “Giftias,” and they live and act like normal human beings but there is a bit of a problem.
They can only live for nine years and four months. The unlucky MC in this show is Tsukasa Mizugaki and a guy who goes to work in the company that makes these robots. Here he meets a girl named Isla, and soon, he falls in love with her.
If you haven’t guessed it by now, the main theme of this show is nothing lasts forever, so you should know by now what the ending is going to be like.
Dubbed – No
Season – 1(13 Ep.)
15. Hotarubi No Mori E
I should stop adding sad anime but come on, this movie’s so good, and there’s even an AMV for this one. This is based on a one-shot manga that involves a girl named Hotaru who runs into a forest inhabited by spirits.
Here she meets a mysterious boy wearing a mask named Gin, but Gin has a curse. If anyone touches him, he’ll disappear forever. Yeah, it sucks to be him but that’s how curses and sad anime works.
The reason Hotarubi No Mori E is so sad is because the tragedy hits you in a moment you never expected and once you realize what happened, the end credits start to roll, and you’ll cry like a little kid who needs his bottle of milk. If you need a short emotional movie that’ll make you cry, this is the show for you.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – Movie
14. Kamisama Kiss
We’re going to break away from this chain of sad romance anime with a wholesome one. Wait, this is more like a bad boy good girl love story so you have to wait a bit longer for the wholesomeness to kick in.
In this anime, we follow Nanami Momozono, a girl who is kicked out of her house after her father spends all his money on gambling. Thanks to her good luck, a man named Mikage offers her to stay in his house after she saves him from a dog.
Nanami agrees and soon learns Mikage used to be the earth deity and surprise-surprise, he has awarded the position to her. Here she meets Tomoe’s familiar and learns that he isn’t the best person to be with but secretly she falls in love with him.
Mikage also looks like that cunning boy you see in high school anime, but he also harbors feelings for Nanami. If you are looking for some bad boy good girl love drama, then make sure to watch this one.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 2(25 Ep.)
13. Tsuredure Children
Watching Tsuredure Children is like watching four or five romance anime at once. You got a ton of couples and each of their love stories differs from one another.
You’ve got the shy couple, the tsundere couple, the bad boy couple, and even a girl who likes to bully the poor innocent boy. The reason I like Tsuredure Children is because of the way it keeps the romance short and sweet.
Each of the segments in the anime features one couple getting into a new stage of their relationship and each of them are different from one other, making the whole show more engaging. If you want an overdose of cute romances, give this one a watch. You won’t be disappointed.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(12 Ep.)
12. Itakiss
Itakiss is short for Itazura Na Kiss and even though it takes some time for the two to kiss, we have the word kiss in the title. The story follows Kotoko Aihara, who is forced to share a roof with the schools and possibly Japan’s smartest student Naoki Irie. Kotoko has had a crush on Naoki for some time but things were a little messed up after a love letter.
Now that they’re living in the same house, Kotoko finds a better chance to confess to Naoki, but this is a shoujo anime so you know the confession is going to involve tons and tons of drama.
Despite all that, Itakiss goes from your generic shoujo romance to one of the most heartwarming stories ever told. There is also a bit of comedy here and there but when the drama kicks in, it hits you in the heart like never before.
Dubbed – No
Season – 1(25 Ep.)
11. My Dress-Up Darling
This is the anime with that blonde girl that has been flying around on the internet and this time we have anime handling cosplay. I know it’s been some time since romance anime added something new to the genre rather than revolving around the same high school love drama. It follows a shy doll artisan named Gojou who meets this girl called Marin.
Marin’s a cheerful popular girl in school and wants to be a cosplayer and what better man to help her rather than that shy dude who likes to dress dolls. The real reason everyone loves this show is because of the characters.
The characters are built from the usual tropes with the shy guy and over-popular girl but the more we see their lives, the more we see how different they are.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(12 Ep.)
10. Say I Love You
Why do we have to wait for 12 episodes to say she loves him? Oh wait, she’s one of those depressed girls with those traumatic childhoods. When she was in grade school, our girl Mei was wrongfully blamed for the death of their class pet and ever since then she has tried to stay away from people.
Along comes bad boy Yamato who also takes a liking to Mei, but Mei has no interest in him. This is one of those bad boy good girl love dramas, but this time the good girl also has a very short temper.
If the boy starts acting way too crazy then the girl is going to punch him in the face and tell him to start minding his own business. But you know what happens when a bad boy falls in love with you, they never know how to let you go.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(13 Ep.)
09. Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches
I know what you’re going to say. Hey, this is a harem anime. How dare you include a harem anime in a romance anime list? Well, my genius man, here is a friendly reminder that the boy chooses the girl he wants in the end, so even though this starts as a harem, it ends as a romance anime.
Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches is about Ryuu Yamada, the delinquent in the class who barely gets good grades in his studies. One day while walking the staircase, he accidentally trips and falls on an ace student of the school Urara Shiraishi and the two swap bodies and soon learns that kissing swaps their bodies back.
He soon joins a particular group known as the supernatural research club, where he, Urara, and his friends try to solve the mystery behind his powers. If you need an anime with supernatural witches then here’s the show for you.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(12 Ep.)
08. Kimi Ni Todoke
Here we have a cute girl who does cute things while having a scary face; that’s alcohol for you. Even though she is sweet and innocent, her face looks too scary, and when she looks at you, you’re probably going to think your dead grandma’s here to haunt you.
It’s all good as long as she has a few friends but what happens when she gets a crush on Kazehaya, the cheerful popular guy in school. Kimi Ni Todoke is an anime with a simple art style and some basic production.
The story is also pretty simple and doesn’t involve a heavy ton of drama thrown at you but this is what plays for its advantage. If you want a short and sweet best romance anime, then make sure to check out this one.
Dubbed – No
Season – 2(37 Ep.)
07. Higehiro
People are going to check the premise of this show and say no way I’m going to watch this but I hope the anime fandom soon learns to never judge a book by its cover. It’s about a high school runaway girl hiding inside the house of an office worker who got rejected a few minutes ago. I know it’s not the best combination especially considering the girl’s past but all this controversy is handled in a really mature way.
So, if you shove away the controversy, you can enjoy a great slice of life romance anime that is way better than other shows with controversy. Characters you thought would be annoying soon turn out to be helpful and the regular anime cliches are flipped upside down to give us a more unique story.
Sadly, this anime has only one season, but on the other hand, you can grab a box of chocolates and binge-watch this one in one go.
Dubbed – No
Season – 1(13 Ep.)
06. Darling in the Franxx
If you haven’t heard about this then this is the anime where the pink-haired girl keeps saying darling. Seriously darling is the only word in her vocabulary. She’s like Mikasa 2.0. Darling in the Franxx can be called the less depressing version of Evangelion.
You’ve got giant robots, you’ve got teenagers piloting them, and even a love triangle that set the internet on fire. This follows a group of teenagers who have to pilot giant mechas to fight alien monsters. Each mecha has a girl and boy to pilot it and our boy hero gets a girl named zero two.
Soon he realizes this girl is more than just a two-digit number. This is also one of those shows with a controversial ending, so get ready to see some really weird stuff during the last few episodes. Let’s just say you’ll never look at a wedding dress the same way again.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(24 Ep.)
05. Nana
Nana is one of the most realistic romance anime I’ve ever watched. Most romance anime just tend to give you the feeling of escapism through its story and characters, but Nana’s one of those shows that drags into its drama, takes it down the rabbit hole, throws you out, and makes a question the importance of life choices.
The anime follows two women with identical names who have completely different personalities from one another. One is more cheerful and naive while the other one is pretty ambitious but also heartbroken.
This is one of those anime with a love polygon with tons and tons of drama, so if you’re here expecting a high school romance anime then you’ll be disappointed. If you watch this show expecting one of the best romance anime ever, you’ll definitely love this show.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(47 Ep.)
04. Horimiya
One of the best romance animes to come out last year is Horimiya. Heck, it’s one of the most realistic romance anime ever to be released. It follows a girl and a boy with unique personalities who fall in love after meeting at school as they manage their dating lives.
The reason why so many people adore this anime is because it explores the difficulties you have in relationships and all the obstacles you must overcome to achieve everything right.
The main couple gets together in the third episode rather than confessing their love over the entire season. Anime focus on real relationship problems like long-distance relationships, envy, family concerns, and other things rather than how to confess.
It will be refreshing if you’ve watched a lot of romantic anime, and the readers of light novels claim that this season isn’t even the best one yet.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(13 Ep.)
03. Kaguya-sama: Love is War
Kaguya-sama is about two prideful students, Shirogane and Kaguya, who are never willing to confess their love to each other because of their pride. This always puts them in funny situations that manage to embarrass one of them or it turns into a competition that results in the victory of one party, but who cares about the main duo.
Here we have the best girl Chika and the best boy Ishigami. Every character of this show feels really refreshing and all these gags feel original because of the unique premise of this show.
The first part of this series ended this season and it is so good it has become number one on my anime list. So go watch three seasons’ worth of Kaguya-sama and be ready to read the manga.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 3(37 Ep.)
02. Fruits Basket
Fruits Basket is one of the best wholesome emotional romance anime as well as one of the best drama anime of all time. This is the story of Tooru Honda, a high school girl who gets to know the existence of the Souma family, who can transform into beasts related to the Chinese zodiac.
Soon she develops a tight bond with the Souma family and becomes great friends with Yuki and Kyou, another two boys of her age. As a person who finished all three seasons, I can say this show knows how to open your mouse and shove tension into it.
Sure, it’s not the tension you see in an action anime, but that good old tension makes you root for a character and feels like giving him or her a hug.
If you need a kawaii romance emotional love story bad boy good girl trope or any other thing you need in a romance anime then this is the best show you can watch.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 3(63 Ep.)
01. Toradora!
On top, we have Toradora. Why? It has an engaging romance, honest tsundere, a plot that touches on all the themes of high school, and a final arc that smacks you in the heart. Also, this time there isn’t a depressing ending.
The protagonists of the anime are Taiga, a fearsome girl with a short fuse, and Ryuuji, a boy with a frightening face. In an effort to help their crushes, the two teams together, but end up falling in love with one another.
This anime knows how to show the character’s depth and develops circumstances that either drive us to relate with them or help us see why these two would be the ideal match. This is one of the greatest romance anime series ever produced, and it will make a huge impact on your heart.
It is one of those animes that I find difficult to sum up in a few sentences because it contains so many amazing elements. Everyone should watch Toradora at least once since it is without a doubt the best romance anime of all time.
Dubbed – Yes
Season – 1(25 Ep.)
Also, Check Out
10 Best Romance Anime Where Older Girl Love Younger Boy
10 School Romance Anime Where Popular Girl love Unpopular Guy
10 Best Romance Anime With Overprotective MC
13 Best New And Upcoming Romance Anime of 2022
Follow us on Facebook and Twitter for all the latest updates & top 10s.
Explore our full Top10 categories
Do you agree with our list of the 22 best romance anime of all time? Tell us your favorite romance anime in the comment below.
