Best Manga for Collectors - GigaBrain (2024)

Berserk.

But, if you had to give something else;

Goodnight Punpun, Vagabond, Vinland Saga, & Monster

all seinen though. For shounen, hmm... I don't read much so I'm just gonna say Death Note, but I also own The Promised Neverland and have yet to read it.

Copying what I wrote last time this came up...

/r/MangaCollectors starterpack (in print):

Shonen

• Dragon Ball
• Attack on Titan
• My Hero Academia
• Death Note
• The Promised Neverland
• Fullmetal Alchemist
• Naruto
• One Piece
• A Silent Voice

Seinen

• One Punch Man
• Berserk
• Vinland Saga
• Vagabond (vizbigs)
• Jojo's Bizarre Adventure (hardcovers)
• Monster (perfect edition)
• Neon Genesis Evangelion (omnibus)
• Blame (omnibus)
• Goodnight Punpun
• Blade of the Immortal
• Pluto
• 20th Century Boys
• Akira (box set)
• Tokyo Ghoul

Short stuff (1-2 vols)

• Planetes (went oop since last time I wrote this...)
• Junji Ito manga
• Nausicaa (box set)
• All You Need is Kill
• Solanin

Edit: Not as popular but still in many collections

• Bleach
• Summit of the Gods
• Grand Blue Dreaming
• Parasyte
• Battle Angel Alita (box set)
• Gundam Origin (hardcovers)
• Made in Abyss
• Spirit Circle

I think collecting multiple series is no problem aslong as you dont start to many.

As for one piece i recommend getting the box sets.

I myself started with vol 1 of one piece, then i bought all 3 box sets at once. Later i purchased another series and after that another 2. Then i slowly began expanding with some more series. But i do tend to complete series or atleast get a bunch.

My advice is generally not to go too crazy early on. People will find stray volumes in bargain bins and use it to pad their numbers.

Thing is that a lot of series become tricky to find after only a few years since reprints aren't that common. Beware any manga you find in the clearance bin at 1/4 the normal price, the reason they are selling it cheap is because the rest of the volumes are likely much harder to find.

The other is just a space consideration. 10 series with only 10 books each is still 100 books. That's a lot of shelf space, let alone all the oversize omnibus runs and etc. I learned early on to be a bit more particular about what I collected.

Never buy manga from scalpers who claim its "OOP" (out of print). It fools a lot of new manga collectors and they end up paying way more for a book when it's only temporarily out of stock.

Buy series you enjoy rather then buying a series blindly. People collect a series and get upset when they don't like it. Ends up collecting dust on the shelf and becomes a waste of money

Go at your own pace and make your own budget.

Also keep a lookout for sales on trusted sites/in store deals. You can save a lot with this

My biggest advice is to only buy what you like for sure. Read 1-3 volumes online and then decide if you want the physical version. Make a budget on how much you want and can spend monthly on manga. Manga is expensive, a good alternative is buying used manga. r/mangaswap is a good place to find used but also local stores if you have any and libraries. Focusing on not many titles at once keeps your mind at ease if you are a person that gets easily frazzled. Keep a list of what you buy, Libib is a good app for tracking the manga you have. Don’t pay hundreds on manga that people say - ahem scammers and scalpers - is out of print, lots of manga are out of stock because of high demand and low supplies. Also remember it’s a marathon, not a race. I feel like lots of people spend money like crazy, go in debt and use credit cards, go below 0 etc. Patience is key, you don’t want to go broke; it’s easy to become addicted to collecting manga or anything.

As for keeping your manga damage free, don’t put manga in basem*nts or attics because of humidity. Don’t put the manga in direct sunlight and the humidity can’t be too high or too low in the room.

Box sets are usually cheaper even if it’s only a little. Omnibuses are cheaper too but usually of worse quality.

I think that’s about it…

Go at your own pace

I repeat. There is no competition here of who gets the most manga in the shortest amount of time or who has the most massive collection. All sizes are beautiful in their own way. We all start somewhere too. Remember this

Also do NOT get scammed. Look up fake manga and make sure to always look at the spines logo. Make sure it is am authentic publisher like Viz, Kodansha, Dark Horse, Vertical, Yen Press etc. (These are the main manga publishers)

Do NOT pay scalpers price never

Again...take your time

I suggest reading a couple of chapters online before making a purchase but it's up to you on this. I say this as it helps you not waste your money on something you may not enjoy at all

Set up a budget and make sure you don't go too overboard. Don't buy manga you know nothing about that's on a good deal. It takes up space and money if you end up disliking it.

Overall, happy collecting !!

I just asked this question myself and I ended up using Libib, Handy Library wasn't on iOS.

But for video games, I would recommend Gameye, if you're looking for something for video games as well. Lets you mark if it's game only, boxed, CIB, new, etc, organizes easily by system, search function works well. Only complaint is the cartridge scanner does jack for tiny carts (DS, Vita, etc)

Someone asked a similar question recently but I really like handy library on android.

Pros:Free, no ugly ads that I've ever seen, scan or search manga to add it to your collection, wishlist feature (which i haven't ever tried), mass deleting (aka long press a book to start selecting them for deletion), and lots of filter options (read, unread, author, genre, series, etc...).

Cons:Alphabetical organization is EXTREMELY finicky. A comma could mess up the order of a long series. Also for any series longer than 9 volumes you have to label vol 1-9 as 01, 02, and so on for them to display in numerical order. I entered one piece into the app as 001 because it's most likely going to break the 100 volume marker. The genre and series feature don't work by themselves and would most likely take time on your end to enter all the info you want. Personally I don't use this feature at all so idc. As far as prices go, it says the MSRP for each book, but it doesn't keep track of recent sales of the book or how much a specific volume is worth. You could change the MSRP easily though to the price you bought it at if that's something you are interested in.

Overall it gives me an easy way to keep count of the volumes I have with a nice UI that isn't hard or complicated to use. Hope this answers your question and maybe some others will find it useful as well ��

I'm using Microsoft Excel, but the free Apache OpenOffice Calc works great too.

I made my own tables, with the info I'm interested in (Content included in volumes, publisher, authors, number of pages, etc.) with links to websites like GoodReads and MyAnimeList, etc. It's easy and fit your needs!

I spend 25% of my disposable income on the hobby. I've put myself on a budget manga timeline where I identify a manga I've been meaning to collect and focus on collecting it on a particular month. Which means I don't buy anything else aside from identified manga and new releases of ongoing manga. For example, the month of March was Naoki Urasawa month because we had restocks of 20th Century Boys and Monster. So I focused on mostly purchasing those series.

I also have a budget for OOP manga just incase someone lists those high ticket series for a price I'm willing to pay. I put about 10-15% of my disposable income into the OOP budget so I can make higher offers. Lol but I'm pretty stingy with OOP, it must be ones I've read and loved enough to pay above 3x coverprice

Recent years lots of manga have gotten omnibus volumes or collectors editions with multiple volumes bound into one. Those are excellent cost effective options. Box sets are another way to save, but those are very tricky and dangerously tempting - you have to be super sure you like the series enough to bite the bullet. I usually read the first volume online to decide if series are wow enough to warrant that large amount of money (and they ofter are not o.o).

I dont like long series (yet i own most of the bleach, haha). Thats especially if the collection is small - makes you feel like you dont own anything if all your 100 book collection is from the same series.

The best part of collecting imo is to meet a true gem in physical form, so i experiment. From time to time I love picking up first volumes of some series, just to see if i like them. There is always that pressure to finish the series just for completionists sake, but you have to learn to fight it xD so i treat my first volume collection of rejects as complete on its own so completionist does not bug me :D

Fighting a completionist inside me is a big one. But i keep in mid that i rather have smaller collection with full volumes only of the manga i love (and my 1 volume rejects :D), than just meh manga that unnecessary fills space. Helps me keep buying them at a slower rate definitely - not buying next volume until im sure that i loved previous. Fact that mangas are short reads in general is a different issue... :D

I also limit a budget in general for entertainment, so i dont go overboard. Honestly, as any collection grows, let it be cards or boargames or whatever, you reach a point where you either have more than you can read or more than you can play, or more than you can physically store or whatever. That really helps grounding purchase habits. I think its fine to go bit overboard in the beginning and let the hype and joy of a new hobby sink in, as long as you know youll be able to ground yourself later on. Well, thats at least how i do it. I believe there is hundred of other ways how to approach it.

DO NOT BLIND BUY! This is the biggest issue I see many have. Just because the series is hyped by others doesn't mean you will like it the same. We have different taste in series so I suggest you start by reading series online before purchasing

Use the Viz app. I heard it is $2 a month and you can read the latest shonen series.

Also purchase series you know you will greatly enjoy. Of course you can only know by reading beforehand.

Go to rightstuff, mercari and even try local book shops near you for the best deals

Have your books away from the sun. Don't ever stack hardcovers as they can damage spine. Do not bag your manga IF you live in an area where it's humid.

Buy what you like, not what you think is popular.

It's okay to go in blind on a series.

Either leave space in your shelves or separate completed with non, or you'll be moving your manga a lot.