MANGA MIRAI, the English-language manga app launched by NTT DOCOMO in March 2025, is shutting down in the United States. The service, which grew to more than 2,400 titles and 28,000 volumes in under two years, stopped accepting new signups and purchases on August 19, 2026, and will close for good on December 15, 2026, as revealed on X:
MANGA MIRAI is Officially ending its US-based digital manga service on December 15 after 2 years pic.twitter.com/pqxvVoKj2g
— Anime Updates (@animeupdates) August 20, 2026
DOCOMO cited the current business environment as the reason. Purchased libraries won’t just vanish, though – they’re being migrated over to MangaPlaza, a sister platform run by NTT Solmare. Without further ado, here’s everything you need to know about it.
How MANGA MIRAI Went From Launch to Shutdown in Under Two Years
MANGA MIRAI came out of the gate with a lot behind it. NTT DOCOMO built the app alongside MyAnimeList, the Akatsuki Group, and MEDIA DO, and it launched with over 11,000 volumes across more than 780 titles, pulling from publishers like Kodansha USA and Square Enix. The pitch was simple: give English-speaking fans a direct line to the manga behind the anime they already loved, plus original titles and previously untranslated series they couldn’t get anywhere else.
MyAnimeList’s massive user base was supposed to help drive people straight to the app, and for a while, the library kept growing at a steady clip. By the time DOCOMO pulled the plug, the platform had more than tripled its catalog to over 2,400 titles and 28,000 volumes, a growth curve most digital readers would consider a genuine success story. That kind of expansion usually signals a platform that’s found its footing, which makes the sudden shutdown sting a bit more.
DOCOMO hasn’t gone into detail beyond pointing to “the current business environment,” a phrase vague enough to cover anything from soft subscriber numbers to shifting priorities inside the wider NTT group. New account creation, new purchases, and app access all ended as of 7 p.m. Pacific Time on August 19, 2026. The website itself sticks around a while longer for existing users, but the writing is on the wall: this was never meant to be a slow wind-down, and readers who’d been building a library on MANGA MIRAI now have to shift their attention to what comes next.
What Happens to Your Purchased Titles and Account Migration?
The good news is that paying customers aren’t just losing what they bought. DOCOMO is moving user accounts and purchased libraries over to MangaPlaza, a US-facing manga service already run by NTT Solmare, another company under the NTT umbrella. To keep access to everything already purchased, users need to set up a MangaPlaza account using the same email tied to their MANGA MIRAI account, and this must happen before 11:59 pm PT on September 30, 2026.
Miss that window and the migration won’t happen automatically, so it’s worth marking the date somewhere obvious. There are some catches worth flagging, too. Titles that were picked up for free through promotions won’t carry over, and a chunk of paid titles are also expected to be excluded, with the full list promised sometime around mid-October 2026. Anyone under 18 as of September 30 is locked out entirely, since MangaPlaza’s terms require users to be an adult, meaning their libraries won’t transfer no matter what they’ve purchased.
Readers who’d rather not have their data and purchases moved to a new platform at all can file an opt-out request directly through the original site, also by the September 30 cutoff. DOCOMO says anyone caught in one of the trickier categories, like ineligible titles or opt-outs, will get a separate email walking them through refunds where applicable. For everyone else, the platform itself disappears at 11:59 p.m. Pacific Time on December 15, 2026, and from that point on, MangaPlaza becomes the only place left to keep reading.
What are your thoughts on the shutdown? Do let us know your opinions in the comments below.
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