All Anime Fans Must Watch! Top 20 Best Romance Anime Of All Time

Let’s just be honest and admit that every story is spiced up if it contains at least a small degree of romance.

We make this top 20 Romance Anime series, since the most trending thing is only top 10 anime lists, so this is a well-arranged romance anime shows you got to watch if you are into this Anime Genre.

1. Kaichou wa Maid-sama

Being the first female student council president isn’t easy, especially when your school just transitioned from an all boys high school to a co-ed one.

Aptly nicknamed “Demon President” by the boys for her strict disciplinary style, Misaki Ayuzawa is not afraid to use her mastery of Aikido techniques to cast judgment onto the hordes of misbehaving boys and defend the girls at Seika High School.

Yet even the perfect Ayuzawa has an embarrassing secret—she works part-time as a maid at a maid café to help her struggling family pay the bills.

She has managed to keep her job hidden from her fellow students and maintained her flawless image as a stellar student until one day, Takumi Usui, the most popular boy in school, walks into the maid café.

He could destroy her reputation with her secret… or he could twist the student council president around his little finger and use her secret as an opportunity to get closer to her.

2. Lovely Complex

Risa and Otani are always being laughed at as the comedy duo. Risa, a girl, is taller than the average girl, and Otani, a boy, is shorter than the average boy.

The two are always bickering and even their teacher sees them as a comedy act. But as their friendship develops, so do Risa’s feelings toward Otani.

3. Kamisama Hajimemashita

Nanami Momozono is alone and homeless after her dad skips town to evade his gambling debts and the debt collectors kick her out of her apartment.

So when a man she’s just saved from a dog offers her his home, she jumps at the opportunity.

But it turns out that his place is a shrine, and Nanami has unwittingly taken over his job as a local deity!

Nanami has all kinds of new responsibilities she doesn’t understand, dangers she’s unaware of, and a cranky ex-familiar who’s… actually pretty hot.

What’s a new-fledged godling to do?

4. My Little Monster

Nicknamed “Dry Ice,” Shizuku is seen as emotionless and cold by her classmates.

When she’s tasked with delivering class printouts, she runs into Haru, who immediately decides that they’re friends.

Shizuku is touched by his innocence and his lack of knowledge towards human relationships.

Though known as a violent and uncontrollable monster, Haru also has a kind and gentle side.

He immediately declares his love for Shizuku, but it takes much longer for her to realize and accept her own feelings towards him.

Together, the two previously unsocial beings help each other learn how to care for others and make friends.

5. Kimi ni Todoke

Kuronuma Sawako is completely misunderstood by her classmates.

Her timid and sweet demeanor is often mistaken for malicious behavior. This is due to her resemblance to the ghost girl from “The Ring,” which has led her peers to give her the nickname Sadako.

Longing to make friends and live a normal life, she is naturally drawn to Kazehaya Shouta, the most popular guy in class, whose “100% refreshing”personality earns him great admiration from Sawako.

So when Kazehaya starts talking to her, maybe there is hope for the friendships Sawako has always longed for.

Maybe… there is even a little hope for some romance in her future.

6. Say “I Love You”

Friends suck, and trusting someone is just setting yourself up. That’s the lesson Mei Tachibana learned after her heart was ripped out and only a shell was left where a girl used to be.

But unlike so many, she found an easy solution: she’ll never make another friend. Ever, but it’s worked for Mei – or at least, it did until handsome, charming and annoyingly popular Yamato Kurosawa came along.

For some freakish reason, he seems to like Mei. He even gave her his phone number! As if she would ever call him.

Except she did. But only because she needed help. Still, he came. He actually came. And now things are getting way too complicated.

7. Ao Haru Ride

Futaba Yoshioka used to be an attractive and popular middle-schooler—well liked by the opposite sex, but ostracized by the girls.

Nevertheless, she was able to brush all that off, because the only opinion that truly mattered to her was that of Kou Tanaka, a classmate with whom she shared a shelter from rain once, followed by quite a few other precious and significant memories.

She even succeeded at making plans to meet with the quiet and innocent boy at the summer festival, but a simple misunderstanding, and Tanaka’s subsequent disappearance, left her walking the halls of her school friendless.

Now in high school, Futaba is not your typical adolescent girl. Determined to become a class favorite this time, she avoids all unwanted attention and, instead of acting cute and feminine, only stands out through her tomboyish behavior and disheveled look.

But still, her world is soon turned upside down when the only boy she ever liked unexpectedly comes into her life once again—except he goes by the name of Kou Mabuchi now, and it is not his name alone that has gone through a sea change.

8. Your Lie In April

your lie in april best romance animePiano prodigy Arima Kousei dominated the competition and all child musicians knew his name.

But after his mother, who was also his instructor, passed away, he had a mental breakdown while performing at a recital that resulted in him no longer being able to hear the sound of his piano even though his hearing was perfectly fine.

Even two years later, Kousei hasn’t touched the piano and views the world in monotone, and without any flair or color.

He was content at living out his life with his good friends Tsubaki and Watari until, one day, a girl changed everything.

Miyazono Kaori is a pretty, free spirited violinist whose playing style reflects her personality.

Kaori helps Kousei return to the music world and show that it should be free and mold breaking unlike the structured and rigid style Kousei was used to.

9. Fruits Basket

Tooru Honda is a high school freshman who is having a serious bout of misfortune.

Not only was she recently orphaned with the tragedy of her mother’s death, but she also has no where to live and is currently residing in a tent!

However, when her luck to seems to be at its worse, she meets the Souma family, and is invited to stay with them in exchange for taking care of the household chores.

But it isn’t long before Tooru discovers the Soumas have deep a secret.

The family is cursed by the spirits of the Chinese Zodiac, and some of the children born into the Souma family are possessed by these spirits.

When possessed, they cannot be “huggled” by the opposite sex, or they transform into their respective Zodiac animal!

10. Ouran Highschool Club Host

Haruhi Fujioka is a bright scholarship candidate with no rank or title to speak of—a rare species at Ouran High School, an elite academy for students of high pedigree.

When she opens the door to Music Room #3 hoping to find a quiet place to study, Haruhi unexpectedly stumbles upon the Host Club.

Led by the princely Tamaki, the club—whose other members include the “Shadow King” Kyouya, the mischievous Hitachiin twins, and the childlike Haninozuka “Honey” and his strong protector Mori—is where handsome boys with too much time on their hands entertain the girls in the academy.

In a frantic attempt to remove herself from the hosts, Haruhi ends up breaking a vase worth eight million yen and is forced into becoming the eccentric group’s general errand boy to repay her enormous debt.

However, thanks to her convincingly masculine appearance, her naturally genial disposition toward girls, and fascinating commoner status, she is soon promoted to full-time male host and plunged headlong into a glitzy whirlwind of elaborate cosplays, rich food, and exciting shenanigans that only the immensely wealthy Ouran Host Club can pull off.

11. Toradora

toradora taiga and ryuji Despite Ryuuji Takasu’s gentle personality, his eyes make him look like an intimidating delinquent.

Class rearrangements on his second high school year put him together with his best friend, Yusaku Kitamura, and his hidden crush, Minori Kushieda.

Along with these two comes Kushieda’s best friend, Taiga Aisaka. Her delicate appearance contrasts with her brutal personality.

Secretly in love with Kitamura, Taiga agrees to help Ryuuji with his love interest as long as he helps her get closer to hers.

12. Special A

Hikari Hanazono has always been second to Kei Takishima.

When they were six years old, their pro-wrestling loving fathers introduced them to each other.

Assuming that she was the best in wrestling, young Hikari challenged Kei to a wrestling match only to be thoroughly defeated by him.

Ever since that fateful incident, Hikari swore to beat Kei in school grades, sporting events—anything.

To do this, she has enrolled in the same school as Kei since elementary. Now she attends Hakusenkan, an ultra elite school, that costs her carpenter father a lot of money.

Hikari and Kei are the top two students in the school, with Kei holding firmly to that number one position.

While Hikari considers Kei to be a rival and important friend, she is completely unaware that Kei loves her.

The story primarily focuses on Hikari and her constant attempts to defeat her one and only rival, Kei, and how she finds love in their rivalry.

13. Golden Time

married anime couple Tada Banri, a newly admitted student at a private law school in Tokyo, found himself completely lost after the opening ceremony, trying to find his way to the freshman orientation.

At that moment, he ran into another lost freshman from the same school, Yanagisawa Mitsuo, and they hit it off at once.

Somehow arriving at their intended goal just on time, there appeared in front of the two a beautiful girl holding a bouquet of roses.

The girl then whacked Mitsuo across the face with the bouquet and handed the flowers over to him.

“Freshman, congratulations,” was all she said, and then left. The stylish, well dressed, perfect woman that had swung at Mitsuo was his childhood friend, Kaga Kouko.

As children they had promised to marry each other one day, fulfilling their dreams.

In order to escape from her, Mitsuo had gone out secretly and taken the examination for this well known private college, but now she showed up in the freshman orientation hall.

She too had taken the law school entrance examination, catching up with him there.

14. Clannad

Okazaki Tomoya is a delinquent who finds life dull and believes he’ll never amount to anything.

Along with his friend Sunohara, he skips school and plans to waste his high school days away.

One day while walking to school, Tomoya passes a young girl muttering quietly to herself. Without warning she exclaims “Anpan!” (a popular Japanese food) which catches Tomoya’s attention.

He soon discovers the girl’s name is Furukawa Nagisa and that she exclaims things she likes in order to motivate herself.

Nagisa claims they are now friends, but Tomoya walks away passing the encounter off as nothing.

However, Tomoya finds he is noticing Nagisa more and more around school. Eventually he concedes and befriends her.

Tomoya learns Nagisa has been held back a year due to a severe illness and that her dream is to revive the school’s drama club.

Claiming he has nothing better to do, he decides to help her achieve this goal along with the help of four other girls.

15. Honey And Clover

Takemoto Yuuta, Mayama Takumi, and Morita Shinobu are college students who share the small apartment.

Even though they live in poverty, the three of them are able to obtain pleasure through small things in life.

The story follows these characters’ life stories as poor college students, as well as their love lives when a short but talented 18 year old girl called Hanamoto Hagumi appears.

16. Itazura na Kiss

When her newly-built home is razed to the ground by an earthquake, low-achieving, clumsy, and troublesome third-year high school student Kotoko Aihara is forced to share a roof with the school’s—and possibly Japan’s—smartest student, Naoki Irie.

Kotoko is not actually a complete stranger to Irie-kun; unfortunately, a single love letter that she tried to give him in the past has already sealed her fate

Throw in some quirky friends and a meddlesome mother, and Kotoko might not even have a snowball’s chance in hell of winning the older Irie boy’s heart.

Yet Kotoko remains optimistic that, because she now lives in his house, her unattainable crush on the genius since the beginning of high school has never been more within reach.

17. Nodame Cantabile

Shinichi Chiaki is a first class musician whose dream is to play among the elites in Europe.

Coming from a distinguished family, he is an infamous perfectionist; not only is he highly critical of himself, but of others as well.

The only thing stopping Chiaki from leaving for Europe is his fear of flying. As a result, he’s grounded in Japan.

During his 4th year at Japan’s top music university, Chiaki happens to meet Noda Megumi—or as she refers to herself, Nodame.

On the surface, she seems to be an unkempt girl with no direction in life. However, when Chiaki hears Nodame play the piano for the first time, he is in awe at the kind of music she plays.

To Chiaki’s dismay, Nodame turns out to be his neighbour and she falls head-over-heels in love with him.

18. Chobits

great romance anime everIn the future, personal computers have developed into “Persocoms,” mobile computers that look like human beings.

Hideki Motosuwa, a prep school student, desperately wants to buy a Persocom but cannot afford to.

One day, he finds a Persocom that has been thrown away and decides to keep it.

When he turns on the Persocom, all she can say is “Chii” so he decides to name her that.

After a while, it starts to become apparent that Chii is more than an average Persocom.

Having much better performance, it seems that Chii might be a “Chobit,” a type of advanced Persocom rumored to have independent thought.

19. Anohana

Jinta Yadomi and his group of childhood friends have become estranged after a tragic accident split them apart.

Now in their high school years, a sudden surprise forces each of them to confront their guilt over what happened that day and come to terms with the ghosts of their past.

20. ef: A Tale of Memories

On Christmas Eve, Hiro Hirono’s bike is stolen by a girl chasing a thief who stole her purse.

He gives chase and finds her unconscious and his bike ruined. The girl, Miyako Miyamura, soon awakes and the two begin to talk.

After making sure she is okay, they end up spending Christmas Eve together.

Later, Hiro finds out Miyako attends the same school as him and they begin to spend more and more time together, Miyako developing affections for Hiro.

Kei Shindou—Hiro’s childhood friend who has long held a crush on him—begins to become jealous and a love triangle follows.

The series also tells the story of Renji Asou. One day, he meets Chihiro Shindou, the twin sister of Kei Shindou, at an abandoned train station.

Even though she’s very shy, they get along pretty well and begin meeting at the same spot everyday; however, Renji finds out that Chihiro was in a car accident years ago and as a consequence she suffers from a disability: her memory lasts only 13 hours.

Nevertheless, after learning that Chihiro’s dream is to write a novel, Renji finally decides to help her fulfill her dream while also trying to make her overcome the difficulties imposed by her condition.

(source:animelap)