Gege Akutami launched Jujutsu Kaisen in Weekly Shonen Jump back in March 2018 with little fanfare. The series caught fire fast, blending curse battles, sharp character arcs, and nonstop action that hooked readers globally.
By December that year, circulation already topped 600,000 copies, jumping to 2 million by mid-2019 as word spread.
Akutami worked under a pseudonym from day one, keeping personal details locked away to let the story shine. Early volumes built a loyal base in Japan, but breakthroughs came with intricate plots around sorcerers fighting supernatural threats.
Sales kept climbing, hitting 70 million copies by 2023, a number that fueled estimates of the creator’s wealth, landing between $10 million and $12 million at that point.
Shueisha’s platform gave Akutami steady pay per chapter, around 20,900 yen for black-and-white pages under recent rate hikes, plus bonuses for hits.
Top performers like this one rack up far more through volume royalties, often 8 to 10 percent per book sold. Simple math on those early millions of copies points to seven-figure hauls building the foundation.
Anime Explosion Ignites Royalty Goldmine
The 2020 anime drop by MAPPA studios changed everything for Akutami’s bank account. Viewers devoured seasons one and two, pushing manga demand through the roof as new fans grabbed back issues. Jujutsu Kaisen topped franchise earnings in 2022 with over 10 billion yen, about $77 million, outpacing One Piece that year.
Movie tie-ins sweetened the pot further. Jujutsu Kaisen 0 raked in $195 million at the global box office, while full seasons pulled streaming numbers that kept merch flying off shelves.
Creators snag cuts from these, though slim at times, like the tiny slice Demon Slayer’s author got from its blockbuster film. Akutami likely scored better on high-profile adaptations, with publishers boosting anime royalty shares lately to 15 to 20 percent in some deals.
Franchise revenue hit new peaks, crowning it Japan’s top earner multiple years running.
Even post-manga finale in September 2024, 2025 saw 3.36 million more copies sold in Japan alone during the first half, dominating charts ahead of rivals. Overseas, U.S. sales charts bowed to Jujutsu Kaisen at year’s end, signaling endless replay value from anime hype.
Sales Tsunami and Hidden Wealth Breakdown
Fast-forward to December 2025: total circulation blasts past 150 million copies worldwide, up 50 million from just over a year prior.
That milestone, announced by Shueisha, underscores staying power even after the main story wrapped. Volumes averaged strong prices, around 700 yen each, turning mass print runs into creator payday central.
Jujutsu Kaisen (Credit: Amazon Prime Video)
Break down the numbers realistically. Assume a conservative 8 percent royalty on physical sales after publisher cuts, and those 150 million units could mean $150 million plus in gross volume revenue at a $10 average global price.
Akutami’s share lands north of $12 million from manga alone, but add anime residuals, games, apparel, and figures, and totals swell past $20 million net worth easily. Various reports peg it between $12 million and $15 million recently, yet 2025 surges suggest higher now.
Shonen Jump stars negotiate extras too, like advances and performance bonuses. Akutami’s output stayed consistent despite health breaks, unlike some peers, maximizing earnings windows. Global licensing through Viz Media and Manga Plus apps poured in digital sales, untouched by print slowdowns.
Merch moves billions in the sector yearly, and Jujutsu Kaisen grabbed a fat slice with blind boxes, apparel lines, and collabs everywhere from fast food to fashion.
Producers share in this via contracts, often 2 to 5 percent on top of base royalties, padding fortunes quietly. Akutami shuns the spotlight, so no flashy purchases leak out, but real estate or investments fit the low-key profile.
Post-Finale Boom Fuels Next Chapter Riches
Manga ended, but momentum rolls on. Season three hit screens in January 2026, adapting high-stakes Culling Game arcs that reignited manga buys.
Oricon charts for late 2025 showed U.S. dominance, with volumes outselling competitors as fans prepped for more animation. This cycle, anime boosting manga and vice versa, keeps cash flowing steadily.
Publishers like Shueisha lean harder into IP now, with IP rights making up 27 percent of sales. Creators benefit from structured deals covering spin-offs, potential sequels, or one-shots that Akutami might drop.
Jujutsu Kaisen’ s dark themes and fan-favorite deaths built diehard support, translating to sustained merch and event revenue.
Compared to peers: One Piece’s Eiichiro Oda sits at $200 million from decades-long run, but Akutami hit eight figures in under seven years.
Bleach creator Tite Kubo, a stated influence, banks $55 million, showing Jujutsu Kaisen’s pace rivals legends. The future looks bright with games, possible live-action pushes abroad, and evergreen streaming pulls.
Akutami’s path proves breakout shonen can mint modern wealth fast. Steady serialization, killer adaptation timing, and global appeal stacked the deck. As curses fade from panels, the financial exorcism on Akutami’s accounts stays permanent, setting up whatever comes next in quiet style.
When fans argue about Eiichiro Oda versus Akira Toriyama, the conversation usually starts with influence and ends with money. The numbers are messy, but a clear picture is emerging of two very different paths to enormous wealth.
Most recent estimates place Eiichiro Oda’s personal net worth somewhere around 200 to 280 million dollars, with several industry watchers and fandom breakdowns often quoting figures above 230 million, driven almost entirely by One Piece.
Financial writeups note that Oda’s income once hovered around 3.1 billion yen per year, roughly 26 million dollars, just from manga work and related royalties, according to Japanese TV reporting cited in entertainment coverage.
Toriyama’s numbers look different on the surface. Mainstream celebrity finance sites long pegged his net worth near 40 to 50 million dollars, which confused fans who see Dragon Ball logos printed on everything from snacks to global gaming hits.
A more detailed financial breakdown from a long-form analysis channel, however, tallies his lifetime manga royalties, anime and film pay, game work, and licensing revenue in a range of roughly 298 to 549 million dollars, describing this as the scale of wealth tied to him and his corporate entity across decades.
That gap is huge. In raw lifetime earnings and asset scale, Toriyama likely edges out Oda, helped by Dragon Ball’s earlier global explosion and deep licensing history.
In personal net worth snapshots, though, Oda currently looks like the wealthier day-to-day mogul, thanks to One Piece’s insane ongoing sales, royalty structure, and the fact that he is still actively producing the core manga every week.
One Piece’s Money Machine Versus Dragon Ball’s Long Game
The simplest way to understand their fortunes is to follow the franchises rather than the creators. One Piece has become the best-selling manga series in history, with official circulation figures moving from over 430 million copies up past 515 million in recent counts, a volume advantage that directly powers Oda’s royalty stream.
Multiple fan and industry breakdowns argue that, on royalties alone, those copies could have already generated over 200 million dollars for Oda before factoring in anime rights, merchandise, and live-action projects such as Netflix’s adaptation.
Corporate revenue tells a similar story. Toei Animation’s report for the April 2023 to March 2024 period showed One Piece pulling in over 22.2 billion yen, roughly 142 million dollars, for the studio, finally topping Dragon Ball’s take of about 19 billion yen after seven consecutive years of Dragon Ball dominance.
For the first time in a while, One Piece looked like the hotter asset on Toei’s books, signaling just how powerful the brand has become in its “late game” phase.
But then comes Bandai Namco. For the April 2024 to March 2025 fiscal year, Bandai Namco’s own figures, highlighted in coverage by outlets like Screen Rant, show Dragon Ball setting a new company record with around 190.6 billion yen in revenue, ahead of Mobile Suit Gundam’s 153.5 billion and One Piece’s 139.5 billion.
All three franchises reached personal bests, but Dragon Ball still grabbed the crown in this broader merchandise and games-driven arena, helped by releases like Dragon Ball: Sparking! Zero and the ongoing success of mobile titles such as Dokkan Battle.
Eiichiro Oda (Credit: NBC)
So, One Piece is now beating Dragon Ball some years on Toei’s side, which is heavily tied to anime and film exploitation, while Dragon Ball still rules Bandai’s toy and game kingdom.
That split explains why Oda can post enormous annual income from publishing and anime even as Toriyama’s broader licensing footprint, built up since the eighties, leaves a mountain of wealth spread across his lifetime and family estate.
Royalties, Rights, And The Future Of Manga Money
The most interesting part of this comparison is what it says about how manga fortunes grow and who actually gets rich. Oda’s story is relatively straightforward.
One Piece is primarily his creation; he has strong royalty participation, and modern contracts allow him to benefit from an era where international manga and anime distribution, legal streaming, and global merchandising are far better organized and more transparent than they were in the eighties and early nineties.
Various fan finance posts even speculate he earns the equivalent of millions per chapter , pointing to his estimated net worth of 230 to 250 million dollars as evidence of just how lucrative the series has become.
Toriyama’s position, as detailed in that deep financial analysis, is much more tangled. Dragon Ball launched at a time when manga artists often ceded huge chunks of international and merchandising rights to publishers and production committees.
The video essay suggests that Toriyama’s direct royalty from certain parts of the business may have amounted to only a small percentage after other parties took their shares, even though the Dragon Ball franchise generated enormous revenue.
According to that breakdown, Toriyama’s income stack looks something like this over decades: around 73.5 million dollars from manga royalties , 20 to 67 million tied to anime and films, 37.5 to 75.1 million from game-related work, and an estimated 167 to 333 million range from licensing revenue attached to his rights.
Put together, this suggests a lifetime wealth range of 298 to 549 million dollars when counting corporate structures and family holdings, not just what might sit in a single personal bank account.
Meanwhile, One Piece keeps catching up on the corporate side. Toei’s recent filings and media coverage highlighted how the franchise’s revenue surge not only dethroned Dragon Ball for that specific period but also underscored a shift in global taste.
Bandai Namco’s record year, with Dragon Ball and One Piece both hitting new highs, shows that modern manga giants can now sustain multi-decade dominance across TV, cinema, streaming, toys, and games, giving their creators more leverage than earlier generations ever enjoyed.
Looking ahead, Oda still has a powerful advantage: he is alive, active, and heavily involved in steering One Piece across manga, anime, and live action adaptations, which positions him to capitalize on future renegotiations, licensing innovations, and new platforms.
Toriyama’s passing in 2024 shifted Dragon Ball’s financial story into estate management. Corporate partners and his heirs will oversee new projects, including recent titles and upcoming anime, built on foundations he laid decades ago.
Fans arguing over “who is richer” will probably never get a precise answer, since Japanese creators rarely disclose full financial details and estimates vary wildly by source.
What is clear from industry reports and long-form financial analyses is that Toriyama’s lifetime empire, stretched across generations of licensing and corporate structures, likely edges out Oda’s wealth for now, while Oda stands as the higher-earning active mangaka with a rapidly growing fortune powered by One Piece’s historic success.
