Naruto Wikipedia

The series is also licensed for regional language releases in French and Dutch by Kana; in Polish by Japonica Polonica Fantastica; in Russian by Comix-ART; in Finnish by Sangatsu Manga; in Swedish by Bonnier Carlsen; and Italian by Panini Comics. Madman Entertainment began publishing Naruto volumes in Australia and New Zealand in March 2008 after reaching a distribution deal with Viz Media. The franchise has been licensed in 90 countries, and the manga serialized in 35 countries. The remaining chapters (245 to 700) belong to Part II, which continues the story after a 2+1⁄2-year gap in the internal timeline. The first 238 chapters are Part I and constitute the first part of the Naruto storyline.

• In 2025, Bandai Namco announced that the Naruto video games had sold over 37.86 million units worldwide.
• Tetsuya Nishio was the character designer for Naruto when the manga was adapted into an anime; Kishimoto had requested that Nishio be given this role.
• Naruto was serialized in Shueisha’s shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump from September 1999 to November 2014, with its 700 chapters collected in 72 tankōbon volumes.
• On TV Asahi’s Manga Sōsenkyo 2021 poll, in which 150,000 people voted for their top 100 manga series, Naruto ranked seventh.
• When the manga ended, multiple authors from the magazine expressed congratulations to Kishimoto for his work.

A series of four “brand-new” episodes, to commemorate the original anime’s 20th anniversary, were originally scheduled to premiere on September 3, 2023; however, in August of that same year, it was announced that the episodes would be postponed to a later date. The first 135 episodes were adapted from Part I of the manga; the remaining 85 episodes are original and use plot elements that are not in the manga. The first Naruto anime television series, directed by Hayato Date and produced by Pierrot and Aniplex, premiered on TV Tokyo in Japan on October 3, 2002, and concluded on February 8, 2007, after 220 episodes. It ran in Shueisha’s Saikyō Jump magazine from December 3, 2010, to July 4, 2014, and was made into an anime series, produced by Studio Pierrot and premiering on TV Tokyo on April 3, 2012. Carlsen Comics has licensed the series, through its regional divisions, and released the series in German and Danish. The schedule was accelerated at the end of 2007 to catch up with the Japanese version, and again in early 2009, with 11 volumes (from 34 to 44) appearing in three months, after which it returned to a quarterly schedule.

An unreleased artbook titled Naruto Exhibition Official Guest Book by Masashi Kishimoto was given to those who attended the Naruto art exhibition at the Mori Art Museum on April 25, 2015. On May 3, 2011, Viz started selling the manga in an omnibus format with each book containing three volumes. Fujimoto suggests this presentation of women may explain why the female characters are often the most disliked characters among readers of the manga. In Yukari Fujimoto’s view, as the characters mature, they show respect to the adults who have raised and taught them, making it a conservative storyline in comparison to other manga of the same time period such as One Piece and Air Gear. Meanwhile, the final battle between the two characters in the finale earned major praise for the choreography and art provided as well as how in depth the two’s personalities were shown in the aftermath.

Novels

It has no text except a brief commentary by Kishimoto about his favorite artworks. In 2025, Bandai Namco announced that the Naruto video games had sold over 37.86 million units worldwide. Twenty-six Naruto light novels, the first nine written by Masatoshi Kusakabe, have been published in Japan. A crossover comic with Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, titled Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles × Naruto, ran for four issues from November 13, 2024, to June 4, 2025. Taira also wrote Uchiha Sasuke no Sharingan Den,d which released on October 3, 2014, running in the same magazine and featuring Sasuke. Crunchyroll simulcasted the series’ premiere on their website and streamed the following episodes.

Viz has also published 16 chapter books written by Tracey West with illustrations from the manga. Tetsuya Nishio was the character designer for Naruto when the manga was adapted into an anime; Kishimoto had requested that Nishio be given this role. Shueisha have also released several ani-manga tankōbon, each based on one of the Naruto movies, and has released the series in Japanese for cell phone download on their website Shueisha Manga Capsule. Shueisha collected its chapters in 72 tankōbon volumes—27 for Part I, and the rest for Part II; they were released between March 3, 2000, and February 4, 2015. Kishimoto drew inspiration from other shōnen manga while developing characters, aiming for distinctiveness within a Japanese cultural framework.

Javier Lugo, writing for Manga Life, agreed, describing the artwork as “dramatic, exciting, and just right for the story he’s telling”. Kimlinger liked the character designs, and approved of the fight scenes themselves, which also drew positive comments from Rik Spanjers, who felt that the excitement of the scenes depended on Kishimoto’s skill in depicting action. Volume 28 of the manga reached seventeenth place in the USA Today Booklist in its first week of release in March 2008, only two places short of the record for a manga, held by Fruits Basket.

Manga

By October 2006, seventeen series had been released in Japan with 417 unique cards. The cards were released in named sets called “series”, in the form of four 50-card pre-constructed box sets. The majority of them are fighting games in which the player directly controls one of the characters from Naruto. Naruto video games have been published by various companies for consoles such as those by Nintendo, Sony, and Microsoft. Thirteen original novels have appeared in Japan; eleven of these are part of a series, and the other two are independent novels unconnected to the series. The series was also adapted into 11 theatrical films and 12 original video animations (OVAs) In July 2015, Lionsgate announced the development of a live action film with Avi Arad through his production company Arad Productions.

Collectible card game

In a review of volume 28, Brienza also praised Part II’s storyline and characterization, though she commented that not every volume reached a high level of quality. Briana Lawrence from Mania Entertainment said the growth of the characters gave Part II an adult feel. The volume had one of the biggest debut weeks of any manga in years, becoming the top-selling manga volume of 2008 and the second best-selling book in North America.

Naruto is one of the best-selling manga series of all time, having 250 million copies in circulation worldwide. Naruto was serialized in Shueisha’s shōnen manga magazine Weekly Shōnen Jump from September 1999 to November 2014, with its 700 chapters collected in 72 tankōbon volumes. It tells the story of Naruto Uzumaki, a young, socially isolated ninja who seeks recognition from his peers and dreams of becoming the Hokage, the australia online pokies leader of his village.

As Sasuke learns the history of Konoha, including the circumstances that led to his clan’s downfall, he decides to protect the village and rejoins Naruto and Sakura to thwart Madara and Obito’s plans. The leaders of the five ninja villages refuse to help him and instead join forces to confront his faction and allies. As Konoha ninjas defeat several Akatsuki members, the Akatsuki figurehead leader, Nagato, kills Jiraiya and devastates Konoha, but Naruto defeats and redeems him, earning the village’s respect and admiration. Like all the ninja teams from every village, Team 7 completes missions requested by the villagers, ranging from doing chores and being bodyguards.