The History of My Hero Academia

Two cancelled series, one revived one-shot, then a decade at the top of Jump.

Kohei Horikoshi arrived at My Hero Academia the hard way. His first two Weekly Shonen Jump series, Oumagadoki Zoo (2010–11) and Barrage (2012), were both cancelled young, the second after just two collected volumes. Depressed and out of ideas, he went back to a one-shot he had published in Akamaru Jump in 2008, My Hero, and rebuilt it. The series that came out of that rebuild began in Weekly Shonen Jump on 7 July 2014.

It ran for ten years. The Bones anime followed in 2016 and ran eight seasons; four films, three spin-off manga, and a shelf of games and stage plays grew around it. By April 2024 the manga had passed 100 million copies in circulation, spin-offs included. Horikoshi ended the story on his own schedule, with the final chapter on 5 August 2024 and the last volume that December.

My Hero Academia, Vol. 2

Volume 2 (January 2015), from the series’ first year in Weekly Shonen Jump.

THE ROAD IN

2007 to 2014

The one-shots

Tenko (2007), My Hero (2008), and Shinka Rhapsody (2008), all in Akamaru Jump. The second of them is the seed of everything here.

The cancellations

Oumagadoki Zoo and Barrage gave Horikoshi two full Jump serializations before he was thirty, and took both away. The road is documented on the before page.

The launch

Weekly Shonen Jump, 7 July 2014. Editor Hitoshi Koike recalled that the first three chapters took longer to finish than most new series: the world and its cast were being built to last.

THE DECADE

2014 to 2024

The climb

First volume 4 November 2014. Within two years: a character guide, an art book, a spin-off in Smash!!, and the Bones anime on air from April 2016.

The long middle

Films from 2018, the Vigilantes and Team-Up Missions spin-offs, stage plays from 2019, and a circulation count that kept climbing past 100 million in April 2024.

The ending

Announced in June 2024 with five chapters left, the finale ran on 5 August 2024. Volume 42, with 38 pages of new epilogue, closed the run on 4 December 2024.

The History of My Hero Academia

THE ROAD IN

THE DECADE

THE MY HERO ACADEMIA SHELF

THE FIRST WORD