Debunking The “Global Anime Fans Want Stronger Female Leads” Research By Crunchyroll

Crunchyroll is a massive company and the OG of the anime space at this point in terms of online anime websites.

With more than 5 million subscribers and probably 100 million or close to in traffic, it’s easy to take everything they say at face value.

After all, a survey by Crunchyroll has more reach than usual, right?

But it’s never that simple or black and white.

Originally published on animehunch.com (and massively exaggerated with the headline), it was picked up by Reddit.

And now here we are talking about it as a result.

Do global fans REALLY want |”stronger” female leads?

Animehunch.com starts out, mostly taken from the source, with this:

“A growing segment of the global anime audience is calling for more diverse storytelling, with significant portions of fans expressing a desire for stronger female leads and more adult protagonists, according to data revealed in a recent research.

A study commissioned by anime streaming giant Crunchyroll and conducted by National Research Group (NRG) reported that 44% of anime fans want to see more strong female leads in their content.

The research was conducted across seven key markets, including the U.S., U.K., India, Germany, France, Brazil, and Mexico, in March 2025.”

The next line is what’s most telling about this “study”.

QUOTE:

The study surveyed 29,000 general entertainment consumers between the ages of 13 and 54, a group that included 3,500 anime fans who watch content at least once per month.

Did you catch it? “General entertainment consumers”. These aren’t even anime fans specifically, despite the research, and the clickbait portraying it as if it is anime fans being surveyed.

Worst of all, the group of anime fans, which represents a minority of the “general entertainment consumers”, only watches anime once per month.

Anyone with sense can see why this TINY sample group is a disingenuous example of “anime fans want XYZ” when it doesn’t represent the overwhelming majority of anime fans in the first place.

Let alone fans who watch anime consistently as opposed to once a month.

The next quote is also a bit disingenuous:

girls now account for 44% of teen anime fans, with the medium now ready to shed its outdated “boys-only” reputation.

Notice it again? “With the medium now ready to shed its outdated ‘boys only’ reputation”.

This comment is another exaggeration. When did the medium as a whole decide that anime, being a boys’ medium overwhelmingly, wants to shed its outdated reputation?

The 3500 anime fans who watch anime once a month?

Not only is this again a minuscule sample size, but it’s talking about fans in the US and not other countries globally that consume anime to a greater degree (the Philippines, for example).

There are many flaws and nonsensical talking points littered throughout.

Crunchyroll should have surveyed their audience instead, but they won’t because they know what kind of reaction they’ll get considering the size of their audience.

More importantly, anime has always been “inclusive” from the beginning, with a few genres dedicated to women (Shoujo, Josei, etc), which have some really good anime shows to back it.

Anime even has a genre for gay fans and lesbian fans, both manga and anime and has done LONG before western media started kissing ass for profit.

These talking points that aim to erase what boys LIKE in the anime community to please an audience who doesn’t even put money into the industry are driven by bias and feel like a “culture vulture” move.

Women are well represented already, and no medium does it better.

In partnership with ceros.com, they published a lot of “data” about the anime industry, insights, and, of course, so-called results from a skewed and heavily biased survey that does NOT represent the anime community.

A community of 100s of millions at least.