21+ Sports Anime To Choose From That Aren't Typical

Do you love sports and anime? Looking for anime to watch during summer vacation?

There’s a lot of anime out there that one could watch and could binge within one sitting.

If you want to try a sports anime or watch one that you haven’t watched yet, you’re in luck! Down below is a list of new or recent sports anime that’s either short or long.

Check out the list of anime and you might find one that you haven’t seen yet.

1. Re-Main

A boy who had quit playing water polo decided to rejoin a water polo team in high school.

The anime will be airing this July 2021.

Looking at the trailer and scenes on YouTube, the animation looks beautiful and I think those who are into water polo should get into this anime.

Check out the trailer and see for yourself.

2. Bakuten!! (Backflip)

It’s about a middle school boy who never became good at baseball as he was mostly like a benchwarmer.

One day he sees the high school team at a park doing gymnastics. He then decides to enroll in the high school and hopes to join the gymnastics club.

The anime series is currently airing in Japan and has twelve episodes. The music is great to listen to along with the animation of the opening and ending songs.

You can clearly see that there’s like a 3D scene within the song itself.

3. Sayonara Watashi no Cramer

Two girls are soccer stars from their middle school as they enter high school.

They decided to join the soccer team and to bring their high school to the top.

The series is still airing in Japan and the English manga of it is still in print.

If you like soccer, this series is good and the drawing of the characters is a bit different.

I do like the opening and ending songs and the animation is good.

There’s a total of 10 episodes so it’s a short anime to watch.

4. Wave!! Surfing Yappe!

Masaki meets a transfer student before the summer break as the transfer student tells Masaki about surfing.

It’s from experience and life lessons that Masaki has to learn as he enters adulthood.

The anime series is short and can be binge-watched in one sitting. It was released in January 2021.

The trailer and scenes on YouTube of the anime series looks great and if you’re able to watch it, give it a go.

There’s not much anime about surfing so it’s an opportunity to learn about it.

5. Shin Tennis no Ouji-Sama: Hyoutei vs Rikkai Game of Future

The anime will be based on a match between Hyoutei vs Rikkai. It’s based on the original anime: Prince of Tennis.

There are only two episodes for the Hyoutei vs Rikkai match but it’s almost an hour long each.

Hyoutei and Rikkai are two rival schools against the main protagonist school: Seigaku.

If you haven’t been watching Prince of Tennis, you might be a bit confused about what’s going on if you just watched the Hyoutei vs Rikkai match. However, it’s not too confusing what is going on if you watch both episodes.

6. Tamayomi

Two girls that have been friends love baseball but got separated later on.

Both girls meet up one day as they have gone to separate high schools and they start to play baseball with their high school team.

The storyline is easy to catch and there are twelve episodes to watch if you like watching baseball anime.

7. Hoshiai no Sora

It’s about a middle school kid who transfers to another school and from there he meets his childhood friend to join the tennis club.

The anime has potential but the ending has ended abruptly. There’s more to the story than the ending of the series revealed.

Besides the abrupt ending, the anime isn’t like “Prince of Tennis” as it is darker throughout the series.

It may not be suitable for young kids to watch.

Besides being a dark series in some ways, it is a tennis series so you’ll see the team’s growth throughout.

The series is still a bit new and those who like tennis or sports should watch this despite the ending.

8. Try Knights

A high school student sees some students playing around but he meets another boy, Akira, who tells him that they were practising for rugby as Akira has given up on the sport.

If you don’t know the sport of rugby, this anime may introduce you to it. However, there are so many bad reviews on Crunchyroll about this anime.

If you can get past the negative reviews, you might end up liking this anime, as is the case sometimes.

9. Harukana Receive

Two cousins enter high school and both girls are insecure about their height. However, they decided to open up a volleyball club at their school.

Volleyball is one of those popular sports that men and women join.

Summer season is coming up and you’re thinking of what to do during the summer to have fun. Why not try volleyball?

If you aren’t sure, you can always watch Harukana Receive anime to see what it’s really about for the sport.

The anime is in a slice of life setting.

10. Clean Freak! Aoyama-Kun!

A student who is obsessed with cleaning is a genius at playing soccer.

That’s the main theme here.

The MC gets attention similar to Kokomi in Saiki K. But avoids the attention and isn’t fond of it.

The animation and art is quite nice in this series as well.

It’s a solid 7/10 on the dot on MAL, to give you an idea. But it’s still recommended.

11. Yowamushi Pedal: New Generation

Onoda is a high school student and wants to join the anime club to make new friends. He’s disappointed that the anime club needs new members.

Onoda makes friends when someone notices him cycling one day, leading him to join the cycling club.

It’s a good anime and it became popular with its debut.

There’s four seasons of the series, movies, video games, a live-action drama and film.

There’s a rumour that a fifth season of the series should have been happening in early 2021.

The music for the series isn’t that bad either.

12. Minami Kamakura Koukou Joshi Jitenshabu

A group of girls in high school wants to form a cycling club.

It’s a short anime series with a total of twenty episodes, and the animation is quite beautiful once you watch the episodes throughout.

With enjoyable moments and even some life lessons, It’s a female-led sports anime that will keep you entertained.

13. Anima Yell!

A high school girl wants to start her own cheerleading club and starts recruiting.

When I first saw the opening song, I really thought this anime was meant for young kids who want to join cheerleading.

There isn’t much anime that is strictly about cheerleading.

The characters have different storylines as the series follows them on what they do during school and cheerleading, similar tot the anime Comic Girls.

It’s a fun and cute anime to get into.

14. Ro-Kyu-Bu!

A high school boy faces consequences that force him to stop playing basketball.

He then decides to go and help coach the Elementary School basketball team. Eventually, he becomes friends with them.

At first glance, you think that this anime series is intended for guys but really it isn’t.

It may be an old series but the animation is decent with cutesy vibes to it.

There’s a total of two seasons but it’s not a long series to watch at all.

15. Long Riders!

A college student discovers road cycling. If you don’t know much about cycling in detail, this short anime series will give you some perspective.

This series will tell you what kind of bikes there are and things of that nature.

The music isn’t that bad to listen to if you’re someone who pays attention to anime opening and ending songs.

16. Teekyu

It’s about high school girls that are playing in their tennis club. Don’t expect this anime series to be like “Prince of Tennis” because it’s not really competitive.

Technically the series is more about following the girls around on what they do while they aren’t playing tennis.

You can think of this aspect like K-On in a way.

It’s a long series to watch and the animation is quite good if you’re into the newer anime style.

Give it a chance if you’re looking for something to watch that has tennis. It’ just might surprise you.

17. Chihayafuru

It’s about a girl who is good at the sport of karuta.

The anime series became popular once it debuted back in 2011 and ended in 2020.

There is no news yet if there will be a season four of Chihayafuru.

When Chihayafuru aired in 2011, karuta became popular in the real world and the manga has sold loads of copies. The anime has almost 80 episodes so it will take awhile to binge watch the series.

Karuta may be a card game but it’s a fun game that needs skill to play.

The animation doesn’t hurt either, as it’s beautiful.

18. Yuri! On Ice

Yuri loses his chance at the finals of ice skating and there he meets Victor, who’ll become his coach throughout the series.

Yuri on Ice is another popular short anime series.

If you don’t like (BL) boys love anime, go ahead and skip it but you probably shouldn’t as the storyline is good and if you can ignore the scenes of BL, you’ll understand why this is an awesome anime.

You can binge-watch Yuri on Ice as it has twelve episodes and there’s even an upcoming movie that should be releasing soon.

There’s not a lot of anime that involves ice skating and this is one of the anime that you should check out.

19. Ace of Diamond

It’s about a boy who has an unusual pitch as he plays baseball for his high school.

Ace of Diamond isn’t a popular anime but many people think that the anime series is really underrated.

Just like some of the older or newer sports anime, I think even if you’re not a fan of baseball but a fan of anime, you should at least try and watch this and see for yourself if it’s good or not.

20. Free! Eternal Summer

A high school student is a swimmer who meets up with his rival one day and after meeting up with him, the student and his friends decide to have a swim team.

When the anime Free! was released, those who watched anime including myself speculated that this anime was going to be BL (Boys Love) anime.

There were some hints throughout the series but it never really happened.

The Free anime became so popular that it got a second and third series later on and all three series are short to watch.

You can tell that the animation is just awesome and that the storyline is great.

The studio behind it is Kyoto Animation.

21. Ping Pong The Animation

Two friends play ping pong but they have different lives while playing ping pong.

The manga is so old and that is why the drawing is in a different style within the anime series.

The new generation that has seen ping pong anime since it was released back in 2014 may not like the old style of drawing.

Some of the older generation does though.

I’m one of the older generation that likes anime but this kind of style isn’t really one of my things to watch.

That said, it’s recommended for its quality in general.

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Watching sports anime is wishful thinking because some of the stuff that the characters do within the series doesn’t really happen in real life. But sometimes there’s realism to it.

The main benefit of these shows is it can make you want to play sports while watching the series.

It’s a great way to get you motivated so that you can go outside and play sports in the real world.