There are manga you read for fun. There are manga you read to keep up with friends. And then there are the four on this list — the ones that genuinely change how you think about the medium. Every one of these has been at the top of "best manga of all time" threads for years. Putting any of them off is the kind of thing readers regret in retrospect.
This isn't a list of fashionable picks. Three of these have been recommended for over a decade and one is the most globally addictive manhwa published in years. They are not similar to each other in tone, length, or genre. They are all on this list because each one represents the absolute peak of what their corner of the medium can do.
All four are widely available digitally. ComicFlow reads CBR, CBZ, RAR, ZIP, and PDF, and tracks your progress on every volume independently — useful for keeping HxH and Solo Leveling open at the same time without losing your place.
Quick Reference
| # | Series | Chapters | Genre | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Hunter x Hunter | 400+ | Shonen / adventure / strategy | On hiatus |
| 2 | Fullmetal Alchemist | 108 | Shonen / fantasy / drama | Completed |
| 3 | Jujutsu Kaisen | 271 | Shonen / dark fantasy / action | Completed |
| 4 | Solo Leveling | 200 | Manhwa / action / fantasy | Completed |
If you want a fully completable run, start with Fullmetal Alchemist or Solo Leveling. If you want the absolute best storytelling on the list, Hunter x Hunter is the answer regardless of the hiatus.
1. Hunter x Hunter
By: Yoshihiro Togashi | Chapters: 400+ (38 volumes, on hiatus) | Genre: Shonen / adventure / strategy
A 12-year-old named Gon leaves his island to find his absent father by becoming a Hunter — the kind of professional adventurer who can earn a license to do almost anything in this world. The premise sounds like a generic shonen. It is not. Yoshihiro Togashi spends the first arc looking like a friendly battle manga and then quietly becomes the most sophisticated piece of writing in the genre, with the most intelligent power system anyone has ever drawn and the most morally complex villains in mainstream manga.
The Chimera Ant arc alone is worth the entire read. It is the closest a shonen has ever come to literature, with character work and thematic weight that puts most prestige TV to shame. Yes, the manga has been on hiatus for years. Yes, every chapter Togashi releases is treated as a global event. None of that should stop you from starting. Even unfinished, Hunter x Hunter is one of the best manga ever made — and the four arcs already published are each strong enough to be career-defining works on their own.
2. Fullmetal Alchemist
By: Hiromu Arakawa | Chapters: 108 (27 volumes, completed) | Genre: Shonen / fantasy / drama
Two brothers attempt the alchemical taboo of bringing their dead mother back to life. The ritual fails catastrophically — the older brother loses an arm and a leg, the younger loses his entire body and ends up bound to a suit of armor. The manga follows their search for the Philosopher's Stone, the only object capable of restoring what they lost. What starts as a quest narrative quickly becomes one of the most tightly plotted stories ever published in any medium.
Fullmetal Alchemist is, by general consensus among readers, the most perfect manga ever written. There is not a wasted chapter in 108 of them. Every character introduction pays off. Every plot thread converges. Every theme — sacrifice, brotherhood, the cost of trying to play god — is set up early and resolved with weight. Hiromu Arakawa managed something almost no shonen mangaka pulls off: a finale that genuinely earns every page leading up to it. If you only ever read one manga in your life, this is the one to pick.
3. Jujutsu Kaisen
By: Gege Akutami | Chapters: 271 (30 volumes, completed) | Genre: Shonen / dark fantasy / action
A high school student named Yuji Itadori swallows a cursed finger to save his friends and becomes the unwilling host of Sukuna, the most powerful curse in human history. He is then enrolled at Tokyo Jujutsu High to learn how to fight other curses while everyone around him debates whether he should be executed before Sukuna takes over. The setup is standard shonen. The execution is anything but.
Gege Akutami took every convention modern shonen relies on and cranked the dial as far as it could go. Power scaling that actually means something. Characters who can — and frequently do — die without warning. Fight choreography drawn with a level of detail that makes every confrontation feel genuinely lethal. The Shibuya Incident arc is one of the most relentlessly high-stakes sequences ever published in Weekly Shonen Jump and changed what mainstream shonen is allowed to do. Now that the manga is fully completed at 271 chapters, there is no better time to read the whole thing without waiting for the next chapter every week.
4. Solo Leveling
By: Chugong (story) and DUBU (art) | Chapters: 200 (completed) | Genre: Manhwa / action / fantasy
Sung Jinwoo is the weakest hunter in a world where dungeons appear out of nothing and have to be cleared before they overflow. After a near-death experience in an unranked dungeon, a system only he can see grants him the ability to level up like a video game character. The rest of the manhwa follows him from rock-bottom E-rank to the most powerful being on the planet. It is, unapologetically, a power fantasy. It is also one of the most addictive things ever drawn.
Solo Leveling matters because it proved that the best stories aren't limited to Japan, and that color manhwa, read on a phone in vertical scroll, could become a global phenomenon. DUBU's art is on a level rarely seen in any comic format — the boss-fight panels are so detailed they look like film stills. The 2024 anime adaptation broke streaming records but covers a fraction of what the manhwa does. If you have only ever read Japanese manga, this is the most rewarding entry point into Korean manhwa, and one of the best examples of where the medium is heading next.
How to Read the Whole Bucket List
A list this big rewards a long-term plan. Hunter x Hunter alone is 38 volumes, Solo Leveling is 200 chapters, Fullmetal Alchemist is 27 volumes, and Jujutsu Kaisen is 30 — that's around 1,000 chapters of essential reading. ComicFlow's progress tracking keeps every series independent so you can rotate between all four without losing your place.
A few tips for working through a manga bucket list:
- Start with the shortest. Fullmetal Alchemist (108 chapters) or Solo Leveling (200) finish in a few weeks each and give you the satisfaction of completing a tier-S series.
- Save Hunter x Hunter for the end. It's the longest and most demanding read on the list. You'll appreciate it more after the others.
- Read manhwa vertically. Solo Leveling was drawn for vertical phone scroll. ComicFlow handles both reading directions, so you can swap modes in seconds.
- Don't skip the slow arcs. Every "weak" arc in HxH or JJK pays off catastrophically later. Trust the writers.
ComicFlow handles all four formats these series ship in — Japanese tankobon scans (CBR/CBZ), official PDF releases, and vertical-scroll manhwa — without needing different apps for each.
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