Anime Popularity, Google Trends, and Nice Boats
Posted by 0rion on October 15th, 2007 - 12:09 am
Google has a search comparison tool called Google Trends, which allows you to look up and compare the popularity of certain high volume search queries over time.
After reading this article, I was inspired to see if I could find anything cool regarding anime related search terms. Rather than performing more generalized comparisons, however, I decided to look up specific shows to see if I could learn anything interesting about them. Read on for the results.
In keeping with Google’s tradition of hiding specific details about their search information, the graphs produced by Google Trends have no y-axis, and there’s no way of know exactly how many searches for a given term are performed. Rather, what the tool is useful for is comparing two or more search queries to see which is more popular, as well as observing general trends for a single search over time.
For example, above is a simple search for Darker than Black. The search term popped onto the radar shortly before the show began airing in Spring ‘07, with an initial peak of interest at the beginning which quickly subsided, and then gradually grew toward a second peak at the finale of the series.
Overlaying Lucky Star onto the chart shows a similar trend, although since that search term is more generic it also has some non-anime related traffic.
Adding School Days into the mix demonstrates very clearly the show’s strong internet popularity, with a huge spike at the end for the last episodes.
OK, so maybe you’re thinking, “Well that’s great, 0rion, but obviously not all of those searches are anime related. How do you know that sudden surge in queries wasn’t caused by something else?”
Not to worry, the cause of that sudden spike is quite easily explained if you just take a look at the next graph:
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No further explanation needed. 
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So which was the most popular new show of this year? According to Google Trends, CLAYMORE is head and shoulders above the rest of competition, surpassing even the whole Nice Boat fiasco.
This is hardly surprising, however, as the shonen market is by far the biggest anime demographic, and CLAYMORE is admittely one of the more interesting new offerings to come out of that genre.
Gurren Lagann, somewhat surprisingly, was pretty low in the Google Power Rankings. Since it’s a pretty easy to mispell name, I also tried combining together all the possible variations and spellings to get a more accurate composite total, but even that showed a fairly minimal increase.
The graph for Haruhi also presents a few unusual details.
As we’ve seen, a show’s searches will generally peak when the final episode airs (mid 2006 here), and then gradually decline over time. Haruhi, however, shows continuing strong popularity all the way to the present.
The secret behind this trend is revealed when we overlay Lucky Star onto the graph. Take a look at the close correlation between the two shows. Finally the shocking proof of what we’ve suspected all along:
Lucky Star == Haruhi!
Seems like all those Haruhivertisements in Lucky Star really paid off for KyoAni. 
Speaking of popularity spikes, this one is just comical. The number of searches for Code Geass increases steadily as the series grows in popularity and WTF factor…and then abruptly drops as the show goes on hiatus for three months, followed by a sudden XBOX sized spike as the final cliffhanger episodes air.
If you’re wondering just which anime is the hottest thing on the internet right now…well, I’m afraid it’s not Haruhi.
The big name Shonen Jump series pretty much dominate the search rankings; a show like Haruhi is barely even a blip by comparison.
Naruto is an absolute juggernaut, and after extensive testing and comparison I was unable to find any other anime that can even come close to its disgustingly huge level of popularity. Note the particularly large increase in early 2007 as the Shippuden arc of the show begins.
Forget other anime, Naruto has surpassed the number of searches for ESPN and even for the supremely popular U.S. television drama 24!
Anyway, this is just a random sampling of interesting search data I stumbled across while messing with Google Trace. Obviously none of this is designed to really be statistically sound research; it’s mostly just for kicks.
So what other interesting anime or otaku related information do you think can be gleaned from search comparison? If you find something cool, be sure to let me know. 
This was actually fairly interesting.
Nice read.
Pretty depressing that Naruto ends up trumping all other shows.
Naruto is the cancer killing the internet, etc. etc.
Naruto being extremely popular is no more depressing than Haruhi/Lucky star being disgustingly more popular than Gurren Lagann.
That’s pretty cool…didn’t know Google had that feature. I wonder what will eventually replace Naruto….
I’ve never watched a single episode of Naruto…
LOL naruto wins all!
Really interesting article, especially the nice boat-school days and the haruhi-lucky star connection.
However, why all this Naruto hate? I understand that it is really cool and all to hate mainstream, but Naruto is actually a very good shounen series. As a caveat, I do have to admit that I think the anime just absolutely kills the momentum that you find in the manga, but the Naruto storyline itself is actually fairly tight and riveting. It even involves commentary about the use of WMD and countries at war, lol.
If anything, I could understand more criticism of Bleach, which might have a better anime adaptation, but an inferior storyline and more generic battle planning.
On a less serious note, while it is funny that Naruto trumps 24, who searches online for “espn”? I would think that it is fairly obvious where to go if you are interested in espn (and of course I would be wrong).
@ Kabitzin
You’d be surprised how many people use search engines as if they were the browser address bar. That’s why the #1 search term on Google is “yahoo”, and vice versa. People don’t type in the URL of the site they want, they type the name into Google and then click on the first result.
Anyway, if you still need more convincing, try going to Google Trends and compare “naruto” and “hentai”. That’s right - Naruto is more popular than hentai. o_0
Also, while I don’t have anything against Naruto, per se, I also believe that it’s way too popular for its own good.
I’m truly fond of those comparison charts, though there might be biases… Imagine the same guy looking for Naruto stuff everyday. I’d also say Naruto is hyped.
I then don’t take that for granted, more even because Haruhi only appeared (I’ve yet to see those official dubs) in North America very recently and has to conquer the continent and the world, by the same occasion (Only people who watched fansubs know what it is really about in terms of craziness and greatness)… I also don’t think it will be aired on TV except for some emission of a certain channel that is only aired at night…
Hope you people see what I am talking about.
On a final note, I am glad that Bleach is away from those horrible fillers right now… I sincerely hope the current situation lasts.
Thanks again for those little bits of brain food. It’s always nice to see what impact anime has on the otaku and general communities.
Actually, I’ve found one anime that overshadows naruto, POKEMON ….. lol
I just did the comparison chart right now and naruto barely takes the lead at the beginning of the first part of 2007 but then it suddenly gets beat during the second part
@ Knowngni
Oh, good call…I forgot to look up Pokemon. Looks like Naruto’s back in the lead now that the buzz around Diamond/Pearl has died down, though.
@ D_Blade
“…Imagine the same guy looking for Naruto stuff everyday…”
Yeah, those searches are actually really all just one guy. I think he lives in Canada or something.
I guess you got the wrong number there. *evil laugh*
I am only addicted to Bleach as a long series (despite its crappy fillers), and even if I watched something like one or two episodes of Naruto read a few manga entries and liked them (the beginning was good I admit), this series surely didn’t left me with an impression that would remain in me for a lifetime… I wasn’t converted to Naruto Uzumaki’s antics.
So no, the Naruto fan you mention is surely not me.
Don’t worry, I know you were sarcastic there.
The worse (I believe) impression I got for an anime was… One Piece (too unnatural for my taste). But I won’t rant on it.
Still I would be impressed if people would prove me they are into it since the start, with some 300+ episodes…
Naruto as a manga is actually a very well constructed story with a fairly diverse and enganging plot. Now, while I don’t hold it in the esteem as something like Mushishi or Haruhi, for an epic shounen series the plot is excellent, especially when compared to other massively popular counterparts from ages past such as DBZ.
The anime moves at an overbearingly slow pace for me personally. Even though certain episodes capture immense panache when animated, for the most part it’s articulated much better in the manga. I still keep up with Naruto and Bleach in the manga series. I’m hoping its juggernaut popularity is due to the fact that the characters are well developed and the world is a genuinely compelling place.
Honestly, I would very much recommend the series provided you read the manga; the same for Death Note for that matter.
What about Naruto hentai??
I’m biased, I love Bleach. The best way to watch these epic shonen shows, assuming you’re remotely willing to do, is to treat it like football. A filler arc is just like your favourite team going though a slump. The feeling of elation when it picks up again is like a valued player returning from the bench.
Honestly, the Naruto vs 24 thing surprised me at first. Pokemon was a given. Thinking about it, I came to the conclusion that Naruto and Pokemon are “mainstream” anime with a fanatical young audience.
What’s really scary is that both of them seem to be trending upward with no end in sight.
I can’t say I will welcome our new Narumon overloads.
I, for one, am proud to have contributed to the explosion of nice boat.
Great….Naruto Win afterall…..Most of my friends they all know about Naruto even they din’t watch any other anime…Maybe the world of ninja is really interesting to other people that din’t watch much episods…
I think when someone like myself, who didn’t watch the recent anime season out of Japan and read almost zero blog posts about School Days, fully knows the whole story behind “Nice Boat”, that says something. My method of learning was by piecing together blogs about it, though, rather than turning to Google.
For the Haruhi graph and its turning back up, do you figure the dub release had any impact on this? I haven’t seen the series, but a Wikipedia check gives May 29, 2007 as the date of the first American Haruhi DVD release, with December 22, 2006 being when the release was announced. I do think I see a little spike in December of 06
Sadly, Google Trends tells me “Your terms - Jang Geum’s Dream, Janggeum’s Dream - do not have enough search volume to show graphs.” No love for the Korean anime out there =(
[…] of the actual final scenes, it’s pretty clear that School Days left its mark. If you saw my comparisons of different anime popularity on Google Trace, or if you pay any attention to either of the major anime blog aggregators, you […]
I don’t feel like reading the above, so this might have been said. Naruto is great. What sucks about it is:
1. anime takes out 75% of the coolness of the action
2. the mainstream-ness, not so much that that’s bad, but it’s been kiddy-fied and marketed like hell
3. due to the kiddification, kids are all OMG LOL its teh kewl and watching anime from other shonen manga, which drags it down
4. the games. no explanation necessary
5. stupid xenophobic america thinks that they need to change the OP & ED because people won’t watch if they learn it’s from Japan.
6. believe it!
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