Naruto Creator Reveals Why Naruto Ended Up With Hinata, Not Sakura ⋆ Anime & Manga

Naruto fanbase has always been largely divided over who Naruto Uzumaki should’ve ended up with. While Naruto did end up with Hinata Hyuga, fans were left dismayed by the fact that Naruto and Sakura pairing actually never materialized.

Instead, Sakura was shipped with Sasuke Uchiha, the guy she had been chasing for an eternity. Kishimoto Sensei finally gave an answer over why Naruto and Sakura’s relationship never happened, and why the blond ended up with Hinata Hyuga instead.

“When I introduced Sakura, I only considered her as another character. I didn’t do it to bring her in as a special female character.

She was at the same level as characters like Kiba or Shikamaru, so there was nothing set in my mind at all about Sakura and Naruto being a couple.

Obviously, they’d be friends and teammates. For Hinata, I decided pretty early on that they’d be together. Then I figured it’d be more interesting if Sakura would be in the middle, creating a messy love triangle,” he explained.

Of course, Kishimoto had his own reasons for choosing what he did. He also says that fans also influenced him to finally ship off Hinata Hyuga with Naruto Uzumaki, to a certain degree.

He said, “To be honest, there wasn’t much space and time to include stuff like that. Naruto’s a battle manga, not a romance story. You have to decide what to focus on, what you think the readers want to see. So I never thought about making them a couple, but I did throw in some nuggets to make the readers think that. It was all about Naruto and Hinata getting married from an early stage.”