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They did it. Those magnificent manga localizers at Viz finally did it. It’s actually happening! After their first set of 2025 licensing announcements on Friday, January 24th, 2025, Viz teased they would have more licensing announcements the following week, including one for one of their most requested series. Then, on January 28th, their X account got hacked the following week by someone pushing cryptocurrency and a $Viz digital token. They managed to recover their account within a few days, but understandably pushed their licensing announcements back another week, to Friday, February 7th. However, on the same day Viz’s account got hacked, eagle-eyed manga news accounts and snoopers discovered print and ebook listings for Kingdom volume 2 with the publisher listed as Viz Media on both Barnes & Noble and Amazon. There’d be rumors and musings in the manga community that Shueshia had been recently shopping Kingdom around for a licensing and localization deal, and considering Viz is half-owned by Shueshia, it’d make sense they’d get first dibs. With the evidence out, all that was left was to wait for the official announcement.

Finally, on February 7th, after years and years of passionate fans requesting, begging, and quite frankly harassing Viz Media to license Yasuhisa Hira’s Kingdom manga on literally every license announcement they’ve made on social media, Viz Media has finally taken the plunge and licensed the Kingdom manga for an English print release, with the first volume set to come out, physically and digitally, on November 11th, 2025. New volumes will be released every month, with chapters being available on Viz Media’s Shonen Jump app shortly after each volume comes out. The series will be edited by Rae First (JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Haikyuu, Dragon Ball Super), translated by Nate Collins (JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, Battle Royale, Juni Taisen: Zodiac War), with the main letterer being Rina Mapa (Spy x Family, Kaze Hikaru, Arata: The Legend) with additional lettering provided by Thom Kilcourse.

Hey, November 11th 2025 is my 30th birthday! Wow, what a nice birthday present to me specifically and especially, thank you Viz! I kid, but I am personally very excited about this. I became a fan of Kingdom after getting to see a press and fans screening of the first live-action movie at Anime Expo 2019, which I gave a rave review! The live-action movies have been my main exposure to Kingdom and are extremely entertaining and exhilarating wuxia flicks. I wish they continued to screen the movies in theaters in the U.S. after the first one, but I was fortunate enough to see the third film in theaters when I was in Japan in Fall 2023, and for everyone else in the world all of the movies are readily available on Netflix. I highly encourage folks check them out if you want to watch some of the best action epics of the past decade and familiarize yourself with the series before the manga comes out.

 

As per nearly all other official international translations of the series, Viz’s release of the Kingdom manga will use the characters’ Chinese names. Which makes sense considering, you know, many of the characters are based on actual historical people. This is not the first time the Chinese names have been used in an official English translation of Kingdom media; I can speak from my own anecdotal experience that FUNimation’s theatrical release of the first Kingdom live-action movie used the Chinese names too, even if the Netflix releases haven’t. I remember even getting comments about that from Japanese readers of my review of the live-action film back in the day because I used the Chinese names in my review. So, to all those upset about this, just calm down. C’mon.

Whatever quibbles you may have about the release, it’s important to get your priorities straight and focus on the big picture of why this news is worth celebrating. Kingdom being licensed is a huge, HUGE deal. Kingdom was one of the manga licensing white whales. A historical epic based on the warring states period of Chinese history that’s been running since 2006 and is over 74 volumes long? Obviously, Kingdom is a huge hit in Japan, where it has regularly been one of the top ten best-selling manga It was hard enough to convince Kodansha USA to license Vinland Saga, which was considerably shorter at the time they did license it, and after they did it was almost in danger of being dropped after its 7th volume if not for fans supporting the series the best they could, and even then it didn’t become a successful seller for them until after it finally got an anime. Kingdom had multiple seasons of anime, and now multiple movies, but even so the series itself is hardly a well-known and popular franchise in North America, and considering the NA market’s difficult track record in getting folks interested in long-running non-Japanese historical drama manga, it’s unsurprising that for many years the Kingdom manga was a no-go for an English license. For the longest time it was considered so unlikely amongst folks in the professional manga community that friends of the site Ryley “The Omnibus Collector,” Colleen of Colleen’s Manga Recs, and Will “FireLunar” regularly put it *not* being licensed as their free space on their licensing bingo sheets for every Viz licensing round for the past couple of years. It’d become a running joke amongst us in the manga press community that it would never get licensed and Kingdom fans would keep complaining about it until kingdom come. Well, now Kingdom‘s come.

Considering that many once-thought long-shot or impossible licenses that we’ve gotten in recent years, including Ashita no Joe, The Rose of Versailles, and Hajime no Ippo, just to name a few, perhaps it shouldn’t be a surprise we’re finally getting Kingdom. However, we’d be remiss not to acknowledge that this is happening thanks to the passionate advocacy of Kingdom fans online and in the industry itself, including the series’s english editor, Rae First. We’ve previously interviewed Rae about his editing career and work on manga such as Astra Lost in Space, and he’s helmed editing many long-running series over the years, including Haikyuu, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure, and Dragon Ball Super. Rae is one of the most prolific and busiest editors at Viz, and has passionately encouraged Viz to license many titles over the years, including Astra Lost in Space and Blue Flag, and now Kingdom as well. Kingdom is a lengthy commitment, and a monthly schedule is quite rigorous, but considering Rae and his team handled 30 volumes of Haikyuu at a monthly pace for two and a half years alongside their other work (not to mention the even crazier speed-ups for Naruto and One Piece back in the day where they released five volumes a month until they caught up), Kingdom fans should rest assured they’re in good hands and savor each new volume as it comes out.

To learn more about Viz Media’s upcoming release of the Kingdom manga, read the official press release below, and check back in with us as we continue to cover and report on any developing news regarding the release!

Japan’s Legendary Manga Series Kingdom Debuts in English for the First Time

SAN FRANCISCO, CA – February 7, 2025 – VIZ Media proudly announced today that Kingdom, one of Japan’s most celebrated manga series, will finally make its long-awaited debut in English, bringing Yasuhisa Hara’s epic historical saga to a brand-new global audience. With over 110 million copies sold worldwide, Kingdom has inspired an anime adaptation, four live-action films, PlayStation and mobile games, and a devoted international fanbase. Now, this monumental series will be fully accessible to English-speaking readers for the first time, publishing November 11, 2025. Kingdom will also join the Shonen Jump service following the release of each graphic novel.

Offering readers a thrilling window into one of the most transformative periods in Chinese history, Kingdom is set during China’s Warring States period and follows Xin, a war orphan from the kingdom of Qin, who dreams of becoming a great general and uniting China. After his closest friend, Piao, dies under mysterious circumstances, Xin embarks on a journey to fulfill their shared dream. Along the way, he meets Ying Zheng, a young king bearing a striking resemblance to Piao, who seeks Xin’s help to reclaim his throne and change the course of history.

About Yasuhisa Hara:
Yasuhisa Hara is an acclaimed manga artist known for his meticulous storytelling and dedication to historical themes. Kingdom is his magnum opus, regarded as one of the greatest manga series in Japan.

About VIZ Media:

Wherever manga and anime fans are, we are! VIZ Media is No. 1 in Japanese pop culture, introducing fans to what’s now, new, and next. Home to the world’s most influential and groundbreaking storytellers and artists, who today drive multiple industries from publishing and animation to film and gaming. If it’s big in Japan, you can find it at VIZ.

VIZ Media is proudly certified as a Most Loved Workplace® in America and Inc Magazine’s 2023 Best Workplace. For more information on VIZ Media visit: https://www.viz.com/ 

About The Author Siddharth Gupta

Siddharth Gupta is an illustrator, animator, and writer based in Minnesota. They graduated with a Bachelor's degree in Animation from the School of Visual Arts, and have worked on projects for the University of Minnesota and the Shreya R. Dixit Foundation. An avid animation and comics fan since childhood, they've turned their passion towards being both a creator and a critic. They credit their love for both mediums to Akira Toriyama’s Dragon Ball, which has also defined their artistic and comedic sensibilities. A frequent visitor to their local comic book shop, they are an avid reader and collector, particularly fond of manga. Their favorite comics include The Adventures of Tintin by Herge, Bloom County by Berkeley Breathed, and pretty much anything and everything by Rumiko Takahashi.

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