Summary
As with most themes, isekai comes in many shapes and sizes, to the point of featuring smaller subgenres. For example,villainess animehave become very popular in recent years; meanwhile, “stuck in a game” shows have been around for nearly isekai’s entire existence. Despite covering quite a few big names,kingdom-building isekai animeis one of the rarer subgenres that, at most, might produce two series per year.
While they might not be particularly common, these types of stories tend to leave long-lasting impressions, particularly due to emphasizing their protagonist’s influence on their new world’s political climate rather than just highlighting their physical or magical strength. These adventures often overlap with power fantasies to an extent, and they regularly feature expansive casts of characters. Let’s take a look at thebest kingdom-building isekai anime.
Updated on June 07, 2025 by Mark Sammut:The Winter 2025 season is done, and one of the lineup’s isekai anime deserves a mention as it incorporates some kingdom-expanding elements. TheSpring 2025 seasonis also about to begin, and it is surprisingly lacking in isekai content. That said, I’m the Evil Lord of an Intergalactic Empire! could be agreat kingdom-building isekai anime.
Honorable Mentions
As long as they are fairly large-scale endeavors, isekai anime that focus on cities will be considered.
Headhunted to Another Worldkind of qualifies as akingdom-building isekai anime, but it is a borderline example rather than a full-blown example of this type of story. Working tirelessly for years but seemingly getting no recognition, Dennosuke Uchimura’s experience attracts the attention of another world’s Demon Overlord, who summons the human so he can serve as one of his four generals. Naturally, Dennosuke is surprised by this job offer, but he ends up not only accepting the role but also excelling in it.
Due to the protagonist not being actively in charge and arriving in an already-established kingdom,Headhunted to Another Worldis not really about building an empire. However, the anime’s stories generally revolve around creating connections with other kingdoms, with Dennosuke having to learn different cultures, customs, and tactics. The Demon Overlord is specifically looking to expand his kingdom’s reach through peaceful means, and Dennosuke spearheads that effort.
Who said taking over a kingdom has to be hard?High School Prodigies Have It Easy Even in Another Worldfollows seven prodigies who end up in another realm after dying in a plane crash. While they all have skills, they are mainly led by Tsukasa, who managed to become Japan’s prime minister at the impressive age of 17. Yes, this anime is pure escapist fantasy, featuring main characters who are perfect and villains who do not even pretend to have any redeeming elements. This makes for a predictable story, albeit one that can be entertaining in certain moods.
Standing in opposition to the Freyjagard Empire’s dictatorial ways and class divide, the prodigies decide to start a republic that reflects their ideals. Naturally, to make this work, they decide to position themselves as deities, becoming the Seven Luminaries in the process. They manage to convince the locals of their divinity through the power of mayonnaise.High School Prodigies Have It Easy Even in Another Worldis not great nor particularly worth watching, but it is one of the few isekai anime that focuses on kingdom-building, even if everything comes together a bit too easily to be satisfying.
While apretty great isekai anime,Farming Life in Another World’s fairly small scope limits its appeal as a kingdom-building story, even though it still contains many of the same ingredients and plot points. Before starting his next life, Hiraku gets a chance to pick his path, and he decides to become a farmer. Waking up in an inhospitable forest, the protagonist uses his OP-forming abilities to establish a homestead. Initially, Hiraku is alone, but his little slice of paradise winds up drawing stragglers and outcasts, resulting in the farm blossoming into a full-blown village (called Taiju).
Along with having a massive harem, Hiraku’s growing community attracts the attention of neighboring cities and kingdoms, most of which opt to start common communications and trade with Taiju Village. Although not diving deep into the political or business sides of running this type of hub,Farming Life in Another Worldemphasizes the social aspect, demonstrating how everyone in the village contributes to keeping the peace. As akingdom-building anime, this show leaves something to be desired; however, it works great as a slow-life story.
On paper,How A Realist Hero Rebuilt The Kingdomshould be the definitivekingdom-building isekai anime; after all, it is essentially named after the subgenre. Unfortunately, the series is somewhat of a mixed bag that, arguably, does not quite manage to make the most of its potential or premise, largely due to offering political challenges and solutions that are (usually) too simplistic to hold much weight or intrigue.
Nevertheless,Realist Herois worth a watch if someone wants a slower-paced story revolving around a protagonist whose strength is mental rather than physical. Due to poor management by its previous summoned ruler, Elfrieden Kingdom is left in rough shape that could easily spell its eventual doom or subjugation; fortunately, the royal family summons Kazuya Souma, who happens to be able to guide them through his Earth-based knowledge. Before long, he becomes Elfrieden’s king, setting the kingdom on the path to recovery and rehabilitation.
Technically, Subspace is not exactly a kingdom or nation, but it is an extensive land with an ecosystem, natives, and a diverse population. Makoto,Tsukimichi’s protagonist, also plays a direct role in morphing this space, twisting an empty void that was created by his ally, Tomoe, to capture her enemies. Set in an alternate reality that is cut off from the rest of the world, Subspace rarely interacts with other empires, which limits the show’s potential for political intrigue synonymous withkingdom-building anime.
That element aside,Tsukimichidoes a great job of highlighting Makoto’s efforts to expand Subspace as a haven for Demi-Humans who might not have anywhere to go in a world dominated by hyumans. The protagonist even stages interviews to determine whether a species would be a good fit for Subspace’s current climate.
Technically, a city builder rather than a kingdom builder, butLog Horizonstill qualifies as it examines Akiba’s place in the wider world.
Log Horizonhas become an oddly difficult anime to recommend, at least as a whole. Seasons 2 and 3 are, frankly, not very good, and they suffer from poor pacing, uninteresting stories, and a bloated cast that takes the spotlight away from interesting characters like Shiroe. However, season 1 represents theisekai genre at its best, telling a (relatively) grounded story about a large group of players who find themselves stuck in an MMORPG.
Rather than just being a power fantasy about curb-stomping enemies,Log Horizonfocuses on the players' attempts to adapt to the world’s laws, regulations, and political relationships, with Akiba serving as their main hub and city. The protagonist, Shiroe, spends most of his time trying to improve Akiba’s standard of living, which involves blending MMO conventions with realistic requirements to function as a society within an established culture.
Born out of the Great Tomb of Nazarick’s ambition and under Ainz’s accidental guidance, the Sorcerer Kingdom is officially created at the end ofOverlordseason 3, setting the stage for a fairly quick expansion during the subsequent cour. Although it takes a long time to reach this point, the story builds towards the Sorcerer Kingdom for virtually its entire run. Nazarick’s Floor Guardians spend their time gathering information and influencing organizations, all to ultimately establish Ainz – the Sorcerer King – as theruler of the world.
Once the kingdom is created, Ainz sets a general objective to build a utopia for everyone, regardless of their race. While human citizens are certainly lower in the pecking order than Nazarick’s residents, they are allowed to exist fairly freely as long as they do not disrespect their superiors. Season 4 dives quite a bit into this universe’s politics, shining a light on human nations that find themselves having to navigate around a new kingdom run by powerful creatures that can demolish cities without breaking a sweat.
Considering their starting point as a slime, Rimuru speedruns the nation-building process, with the Jura-Tempest Federation becoming official roughly 15 episodes in the anime. Beginning with wolves and goblins, Rimuru initially created a safe village for demi-humans, which eventually spiraled into a nation that was home to all types of monsters. This was an unprecedented move in this world, and it naturally attracted the attention of neighboring kingdoms.
Whileextremely powerful and more than capable of wiping out human armies, Rimuru’s goal is to live in harmony with other domains by establishing mutually beneficial relationships. That proved to be possible with a few small nations; however, bigger kingdoms like Falmuth opted to wage war against Jura-Tempest, a decision that came with steep consequences for the invaders. More so than every other isekai anime,That Time I Got Reincarnated As A Slimeshines a bright spotlight on Jura-Tempest’s residents, highlighting their day-to-day lives as they exist within this kingdom created by Rimuru.The Slime Diariesspecifically focuses on this aspect.
Spring 2024’s season 3 is almost entirely devoted to exploringReincarnated as a Slime’s political climate and volatile relationship with other kingdoms, which involves a lot of meetings, battles fueled by misinformation or manipulation, and power struggles.
