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LINE Manga App Becomes Top-Grossing App in Japan in 1st Quarter 2025
posted on by Wonhee Cho
According to mobile analytics firm Sensor Tower, LINE Manga — Naver WEBTOON's Japanese-language service — ranked No. 1 in total app market revenue in Japan in the first quarter of 2025. This milestone comes as the platform celebrates its 12th anniversary, having launched in 2013.
LINE Manga first overtook Kakao Piccoma's digital manga and novel platform Piccoma in May 2024 and went on to claim the top spot in Japan's non-gaming app revenue in the second half of last year. The app has maintained that lead into 2025, reversing the market dynamics for the first time in four years.
Piccoma was still the app with the highest consumer spending in Japan for 2024, according to Data.ai. LINE Manga came third.
Naver WEBTOON attributes LINE Manga's success not only to the growing global popularity of Korean webtoons but also to its strategic focus on nurturing local creators and partnering with Japanese production studios to build a robust content ecosystem.
The platforms of LINE Manga, including LINE Manga and ebook Japan, saw a sharp increase in paid content revenue, with paid sales of the platforms reaching US$594.3 million in 2024, a 12.7% increase year-over-year. When including advertising and IP-based business growth, Naver WEBTOON's total revenue in Japan reached US$648.3 million last year.
LINE Digital Frontier CEO Shin-bae Kim had announced on February 13 that the company would produce 20 animated adaptations of webtoons this year, significantly expanding its webtoon-based intellectual property (IP) business. LINE Digital Frontier is the operator of LINE Manga.
Source: iNews24 (Yu-rim Jeong)
