'Manhwa Heaven' Also Dominates Webtoons in Japan... 60% of Japanese Artists "Willing to Draw"

Easier Debut Than Traditional Magazine Serialization
Domestic Platforms "Focus on Discovering Local Japanese Writers"

The Japanese manga industry, once the "manga paradise" dominating the global comic market, has recently turned its attention to webtoons.

On the 14th, Japanese consumer trend research firm MMD Research Institute released a survey titled "Survey on Webtoon Production," targeting 1,320 people who had experience creating manga in the past year.

In the survey, 46.8% of respondents (multiple answers allowed) said they had created "vertical reading manga," i.e., webtoons, during this period. Although this figure does not surpass the 50.8% who said they created traditional "horizontal reading manga," it is a very high number considering the status of published manga in Japan.

Additionally, among creators who have experience making horizontal reading manga, 58.9% said they "intend to create webtoons in the future."

Traditional horizontal manga and scroll-style webtoons differ not only in the direction in which the images are placed but also significantly in the presentation that induces reader immersion, as well as the size and arrangement of panels. Therefore, when converting existing horizontal manga into webtoons or vice versa into print volumes, substantial revisions are required.

Netflix animation 'Lookism'. It is based on the Naver webtoon of the same name, which gained great popularity in Japan as well.
[Image source=Provided by Netflix]

Thus, the fact that Japanese manga artists, who have been producing right-to-left bound print manga (Ucheol binding), are turning their attention to webtoons can be interpreted as a gradual acceptance of a new format.

This is also analyzed to be influenced by the growth of the webtoon market within Japan and the fact that for new artists, webtoons offer easier debut and promotion opportunities. While publishing manga in magazines requires passing the stringent screening of well-known publishers, webtoons can be directly shown to readers through amateur platforms.

In fact, a separate survey of 500 people who produced webtoons in the past year showed that 34.2% submitted to Line Manga, 21.8% to Pixiv Comic, and 18.4% to Comico, all webtoon platforms. Creators who used Twitter and Instagram were 31.4% and 27.8%, respectively. In contrast, only 11.2% said they submitted to publishers.

In response, webtoon platforms are also focusing on discovering local Japanese creators. Naver Webtoon stated, "Given the long history of the manga industry and the large number of aspiring manga artists in the Japanese market, the better the webtoon creator ecosystem is established, the higher the possibility of unique original works with diverse genres and vast worldviews emerging," adding, "We will work harder to strengthen the Japanese creator ecosystem."