So you want to watch My Hero Academia online. Good. The Daily Dot’s own Caitlin Moore called it “fun and worth sinking your teeth into,” but that’s just scraping the surface. The series swept the 2017 Crunchyroll awards and the My Hero Academia movie is coming to America soon.
Like a lot of anime, where and how to watch it depends on your tastes. Prefer the original Japanese voice acting with English subtitles, or do you want to focus on the action and let English voice actors do their best to mimic the original script? Whatever you prefer, here are the best ways to watch My Hero Academia online without cable.
How to watch My Hero Academia online
1) Crunchyroll
Crunchyroll and Funimation may have combined forces recently, but that doesn’t mean there aren’t still some key differences between the two primary anime platforms. Crunchyroll is primarily focused on providing anime that’s subbed in English. A full list of anime that’s dubbed can be found here, but you’ll notice that My Hero Academia isn’t on there.
To its credit, this does mean that Crunchyroll often gets the latest episode of My Hero Academia (and many other shows) about a week before their dub release. My Hero Academia is no exception.
Crunchyroll offers some shows for free with ads, but My Hero Academia isn’t among them either. That means you’ll need to pay $6.95 a month after a two-week free trial. The My Hero Academia manga isn’t available on Crunchyroll’s online service, but you can buy physical editions for about $9.95 a piece.
You can watch Crunchyroll shows on a desktop, Android or iOS devices, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Wii U.
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2) Funimation
Funimation is technically under Crunchyroll’s and the VRV’s umbrella, but if you prefer English dubs over subs, it’s game over for any other service.
Funimation’s subscription plan costs just $5.99 a month after a two-week trial.
Funimation is available on desktop, Android, iOS, Roku, Apple TV, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, Chromecast, Amazon Fire TV and Kindle, Windows, and Samsung devices.
If you’re hoping to keep up with the show as it releases, you’re out of luck. My Hero Academia dubbed episodes take a week to release after the simulcast of the subbed episodes.
While we’re on the subject of downsides, it’s worth noting that both Crunchyroll and Funimation have less-than-ideal desktop versions of their services. You’ll definitely notice that it’s a little clunkier than the app versions.
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3) VRV
If you’re OK with paying a little bit more, VRV might be the best bang for your buck solution. In Crunchyroll’s own words, VRV is kind of like paying to add HBO to your cable package, and subscribing just to Crunchyroll is like getting HBO Go.
For $9.99 a month (after a 30-day trial), VRV users gain access to Crunchyroll, Funimation, and a bunch of other geek culture channels like Geek & Sundry, Nerdist, and Rooster Teeth.
There’s basically no major downsides to the service, since you can switch to Crunchyroll or Funimation depending on your tastes.
VRV is available on desktop, iOS, Android, Fire TV, Apple TV, Xbox One, PlayStation 4, Chromecast, “newer” Roku devices, with more devices to be announced, according to VRV’s support page. VRV Premium users are also afforded offline viewing via the VRV app on iOS and Android.
4) Hulu
Hulu has managed to stream every episode of My Hero Academia’s subbed version, but it takes at least a couple weeks for Hulu to get the dubbed version.
Hulu’s “limited commercials” mode costs $7.99 a month or you can upgrade to the commercial-free version for $11.99 a month after a free month-long trial. The $39.99 Hulu with Live TV automatically includes Hulu Limited Commercials. On the plus side, there’s a lot of great anime on Hulu to watch when you’re done.
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5) Adult Swim
Adult Swim offers the first season and, strangely enough, just one episode from season 2. So if you’ve got a cable provider account login handy, it might be worth it to check out the first season and get a taste for the show.
Editor’s note: This article is regularly updated for relevance.
