Kingdom

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Japanese: キングダム

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Information

Type: Manga

Volumes: Unknown

Chapters: Unknown

Status: Publishing

Published: Jan 26, 2006 to ?

Genres: Action, Award Winning

Themes: Historical, Military

Demographic: Seinen

Serialization: Young Jump

Authors: Hara, Yasuhisa (Story & Art)

Statistics

Score: 9.02¹ (scored by 70,157 users)

¹ indicates a weighted score.

Ranked: #13²

² based on the top manga page. Please note that 'R18+' titles are excluded.

Popularity: #50

Members: 196,930

Favorites: 16,840

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@kingdom_yj

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9.02

Ranked #13Popularity #50Members 196,930

MangaYoung JumpHara, Yasuhisa (Story & Art)

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Kingdom

Vol. 1
$10.99

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Synopsis

During the Warring States period in China, Xin and Piao are two brother-like youngsters who dream of becoming Great Generals, despite their low status as orphaned slaves. One day, they encounter a man of nobility, who gives Piao an opportunity to undertake an important duty within the state of Qin's royal palace. Parting ways, Xin and Piao promise each other to one day become the greatest generals in the world. However, after a fierce coup d'état occurs in the palace, Xin meets with a dying Piao, whose last words spur him into action and lead him to encounter the young and soon-to-be king of Qin, Zheng Ying.

Although initially on bad terms, Xin and Zheng become comrades and start on a path filled with trials and bloodshed. Zheng's objective is to bring all the warring states under Qin, and Xin seeks to climb to the very top of the army ranks. Against a backdrop of constant tactical battle between states and great political unrest, both outside and within the palace, the two endeavor towards their monumental ambitions that will change history forever.

[Written by MAL Rewrite]

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BackgroundIn 2013, Kingdom was awarded the 17th Annual Tezuka Osamu Cultural Grand Prize. As of December 2024, the series has sold over 110 million copies.

On December 12, 2012, the series won a Guinness World Record for manga written by the most people. The record was made possible due to its Social Kingdom Campaign, where artists, fans, and voice actors redrew the entire 26th volume. Each participant picked and redrew one frame; the top 100 would be given a special edition of the manga. Eiichiro Oda (One Piece), Masashi Kishimoto (Naruto), Hirohiko Araki (JoJo no Kimyou na Bouken), and many others were among the participants.

A live-action movie of Kingdom was released on April 19, 2019, a second one on July 15, 2022, a third one on July 28, 2023, and a fourth one on July 12, 2024.

Kingdom has been published in English by VIZ Media under the VIZ Signature imprint since November 11, 2025.

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Related Entries

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Characters

Xin

Main

Lei, Qiang

Main

Ying, Zheng

Main

He Liao, Diao

Main

Wang, Qi

Supporting

Huan, Yi

Supporting

Wang, Jian

Supporting

Gong, Biao

Supporting

Li, Mu

Supporting

Meng, Tian

Supporting

Reviews

May 15, 2015

HaXXspetten

Recommended

Preliminary (431/? eps)

I've always been a bit puzzled as to why Kingdom isn't any more popular on this site. Despite having been publishing on a consistent weekly basis for nearly a decade by now, and despite being one of the highest rated manga on MAL, I still essentially never see anyone talk about it. It almost feels like people aren't even aware that it exists. I think this is very unfortunate, because they're missing out on what is perhaps the most inspirational manga I've ever had the pleasure of reading.

The story takes place during the Chinese Warring States period. After a full 500 years of constant warfare ... between the various states of China, the bloodshed still shows no sign of stopping anytime soon. It is here our story begins with a young man named Shin who has the naïve dream of becoming the greatest general in all of China. After accidentally becoming involved in a conflict over the royal throne of the state of Qin, he eventually ends up serving under the new young king who has the ambition to one day unite all of China under one banner.

As a result, Kingdom is a manga of epic proportions, containing large scale warfare with hundreds of thousands of soldiers, advanced military strategizing and incredible intensity. The battles are long and complicated, but perfectly understandable as the author's style of writing is extremely detailed and also utilizes tons of tactical maps, overviews and time jumps to explain the flow of combat. It's intelligent but without requiring much from the reader in order to keep up with the plot.

At the same time Kingdom also has extremely in-depth national politics and diplomacy between nations, further enhancing the overall sense of realism. Speaking of which, it should be stated that the manga is in fact based on true events and characters from Chinese history. Of course it's only loosely based on it as the historical records only dictate *what* happens, but the author is the one who decides *how* it happens. In other words he manages to create a story which is perhaps exaggeratedly epic, yet still never contradicts the actual true events.

The best part of Kingdom however is undoubtedly the characters. The story covers many years of time, and thus you get to see how everyone gradually grows and evolves over the course of time in very high detail. There are hundreds and hundreds of notable figures in the story, consisting of generals, commanders, soldiers, civilians, politicians, royalty and more. Especially the main military figures are superbly written, with incredible charisma and all with their own individual traits. The vast majority of them are almost impossible to dislike, regardless of which state they may come from. The amount of color they bring to the battlefield simply cannot be understated, and it feels like they're not just raising the morale of their respective soldiers in the manga itself, but the morale of the readers as well. At the same time, some of the death scenes in this manga are some of the most tragic and emotional death scenes I've ever seen in media. When one of your favorite characters passes away, you will truly feel it. Furthermore, the sheer amount of inspirational and downright moving speeches throughout the course of Kingdom is simply astonishing. The author truly knows how to touch the hearts of the readers with the way he's written the story. I really cannot praise him enough for it.

The art is extremely high detail and helps to amplify the level of intensity of the story. Especially the armies and the battlefields look simply fantastic and sometimes it makes you feel like you're really there. While it may not exactly be on the level of something like Berserk in terms of visuals, it's still more than enough to appropriately showcase the cold and harsh reality of the field of battle, and deliver that atmosphere to the readers first-hand.

Kingdom has some very long arcs occasionally during the more drawn-out battles, and I'll just say here and now that when you're in one of those segments, it's effectively impossible to stop reading it. Why? Because every single chapter ends in a huge cliffhanger! This is one of those stories which just keeps teasing you and forces you to keep reading the next chapter. And the next one. And the next one. And the- ...you get the idea. Point being that despite it having over 400 chapters published at the time of writing this, you can still easily read through all of it in just a few days, no problem whatsoever. It's just *that* addictive once you start.

Overall, in my eyes Kingdom is a manga which seriously needs more attention. I'm still not sure exactly why so few people have read it, but I really wish more people would give it a chance because it truly is one of the most influential and impressive manga out there. It stands out as a very atypical manga to begin with, but above all it is exceedingly rare for a story to be so action-packed, so intelligent yet so incredibly emotional all at the same time.

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Sep 11, 2018

ChouEritto

Mixed Feelings

Preliminary (294/? eps)

Kingdom is a series that people like to hype up these days and indeed has a great premise of ancient Chinese warfare that harkens back to wide spanning stories such as Romance of the Three Kingdoms. However, its poor presentation and repetitive nature causes it to be about as impressive as a second-rate Shonen.

Now, it certainly isn't an absolutely terrible series (though it being rated a 5 and not a 1 should make that obvious). It seems to have some semblance of war strategies and some of the supporting characters do develop as the story goes on to some extent.

The main complaint of the series' ... execution lies intertwined with both its plot and characters, or more specifically, its main character. Xin is a terrible protagonist as not only is his personality and motivation a typical hotheaded youth wanting to be the best in the likes of Naruto, but the plot armour provided to him is insane for a series that attempts to pass itself off as a historical piece. Not only does Xin outperform and defeat skilled assassins without much real experience, but doesn't even do it through actual tactics and instead just by shouting and overcoming his opponent through willpower as in any run of the mill Shonen. This practically betrays any engaging premise the series could hold as the attempts at strategies and the support characters' roles are made meaningless when the climax of several major battles focus on a kid overcoming challenges by himself without any thought put into it.
It also doesn't help that many of the support characters seem overly interested in Xin's actions or potential without much reason to do so, such as Wang Yi practically entrusting his legacy to him for typical passing the torch reasons within coming of age stories or the young girl having romantic feelings for someone so dense it took them over a hundred chapters to realise they were female.
Now, I can't fully say if the quality has improved since I dropped this work almost 300 chapters in, but if a series takes that long to become more than a typical Shonen in more than explicit content, there's no real reason to view it in any worthwhile light. Yes, some series take a while to get good, but over 300 chapters in is more than pushing the limit.

To get to the point, Kingdom gives too much of a focus to its protagonist and his Naruto-esque lack of logic to the point it heavily damages the series' overall quality. Overall, this series that is supposedly praised for its genius is one with such a lack of logic revolving around the centrepiece that it could be insulting to my intelligence.
If wanting a good manga about Ancient Chinese warfare with genius strategies and very little plot armour, read Sangokushi or most Romance of the Three Kingdoms adaptions in general (particularly the 2010 live action series Three Kingdoms) or if wanting a period drama with memorable and well written characters, watch Rose of Versailles.

Overall ranking - 5/10 mediocrity

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Dec 19, 2025

Lucianael

Not Recommended

Funny

Well-written

Preliminary (851/? eps)

Kingdom is a particularly difficult Manga for me to talk about, because much of what I think of it stands in stark opposition to what it claims itself to be. Kingdom is a story for peace; it is a story that knows how horrible wars are, it is a story that is much about the importance of human connection, of seeing the value of even the smallest, most meagre man within an army of tens of thousands. Yet it is also a story that turns the violence of battle into simple entertainment, that shows fields of war as the sole domain of certain individuals who, ...

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