10 Best Legal Sites For Manga And Manhwa
Reading manga is extremely enjoyable with its great art and immersive storylines. With a wide genre and variety of manga, you can immerse yourself in the amazing stories finely crafted by the authors of the manga.
But, reading manga can be a bit tough when they are so expensive outside of Japan, which is why most people instead prefer to read them online on illegal manga reading sites. These sites upload illegal manga scans and profit from them.
This causes the publishers and the creators of the manga to lose money. If you want to support manga authors while still reading them online, then you must read on the few legal manga reading sites that are available.
All the sites in this list are legal and have copyright permission to host the manga and manhwa. The creators are paid based on all the profit their manga and comics make. In other words, by using these sites, you also help the authors and creators of your favorite manga.
Without further ado, Let’s look at some of the best legal sites for manga reading.
1. Viz
Viz Media is quite possibly the biggest manga and anime distributor in America. The company is the no. 1 spot for all manga and anime lovers in the US, and you can read manga on their site.
Viz Manga is a legal manga reading site where you can read all the popular manga titles and their latest chapters which are simultaneously published all around the world along with Japan. So, with Viz Manga, you don’t have to wait for the English-translated chapters.
Though Viz Manga is a subscription-based service, you can read the three most recent chapters of any manga, as well as the first three chapters, for free. To read any other chapters, you would need to pay only $1.99/month for the subscription, and you would have full access to over 10,000+ manga chapters!!
2. Manga Plus
Shueisha is the largest Japanese manga publishing company that has published multiple highly popular manga titles like One Piece, Naruto, Black Clover, etc. in its magazine called Weekly Shonen Jump, which is the biggest manga anthology magazine in Japan.
MangaPlus is the official manga reading site launched by Shueisha where you can read all the manga published in Shonen Jump for free. On the site, you can only read the first and the most recent three chapters, and to read all chapters for free, you can download their app by the same name.
New chapters of every manga are all around the world at the same time as they are released in Japan.
3. Crunchyroll
If you love watching anime, you might’ve already heard of Crunchyroll. After all, it is one of the biggest anime distribution and licensing companies in the world. But, what you might not have known is that the Crunchyroll site also offers manga for its users.
To read manga online legally, Crunchyroll is a great option. Though its library is not super big, it still has a bunch of popular manga titles like Re: Monster, Orange, Genshin Impact, etc.
But, its library is nothing special compared to other sites on this list.
4. BookWalker
BookWalker is an online store that sells digital copies of both manga and light novels at a good price. It is one of the best places for you to get ebooks of your favorite manga and light novels, and read them in their app itself.
You can enjoy their wide collection of both manga and light novels, whether it be Fantasy, BL, Shounen, or other awesome manga genres.
It has an app for both Android and iPhone in which you buy the manga and read them. You can also customize your bookshelf in the app.
5. Webtoon
If you’ve had your fill of manga, then let’s move on to one of the best webtoon reading sites. If you’re not familiar with the word, Webtoons are simply Korean digital comics created as long strips of drawings you can read on your phone by scrolling from top to down.
Webtoon.com is one of the most popular platforms for webtoon lovers. It is free to use and you can read thousands of original comics with amazing art and stories. It also has a free app you can download.
You can filter through by popular, genres, and new webtoons, to get your next read. The chapters are also updated weekly.
6. Tapas
Tapas is another great webtoon reading site. It hosts thousands of original comics with most of them in the romance and fantasy genre. In 2021, the company reported that it had over 61,000 creators working with them.
It offers comics in various genres like Romance, Fantasy, Thriller, etc. Also, it has some pretty explicit mature content. It also has English-translated Korean Light novels.
On the site, the first couple of chapters for any comic is free but, to read the following chapters, you would need to pay.
If can’t afford to pay to read webtoons and manga, then check out my article on the 13 Best Free Manga Reading Sites.
7. Lezhin Comics
Lezhin Comics was launched back in 2013 by a South Korean blogger. It is another highly popular webtoon reading platform.
You can read the first couple of comic chapters for free on the Lezhin Comics site and app, but to read the rest you would have to buy coins which you can then use to unlock chapters. It also has a “Free” section in which you can read manga for free.
8. Toomics
Toomics is a great premium comic reading platform. Unlike other sites on this list, Toomics hosts both Webtoons and Manhua across multiple genres like Action, Horror, Romance, etc.
But, once again, you would have to pay to read the chapters after the first couple of free chapters. New chapters are uploaded weekly.
It hosts mature adult comics as well, but there’s also a family-friendly option you can select to prevent mature content from showing up.
9. Tappytoon
Tappytoon is a premium digital comic reading platform (both a site and an app) with millions of readers a month. They offer a wide collection of Webtoons and Korean Web novels in multiple languages spanning various genres like Action, Martial Arts, Romance, etc.
The first 4 chapters of all webtoons are free to read but the rest must be unlocked using money. If the webtoon is new, 10-15 chapters could be available for free, but once the webtoon starts getting more readers, the chapters would get locked.
10. Bilibili Comics
With both Manga and Manhwa out of the way, now it’s time to talk about some Manhua which are Chinese comics. Just like manga and manhwa, manhua also offers a wide range of stories from romance to action that would suck you in.
Bilibili Comics is the official Manhua reading site and app by Bilibili Comics Pt. Ltd. You can choose from the tons of original comics they offer and read all the chapters for free either on their site or on the app.
