Webtoon Anime Adaptations: Why Sony's Hayate Is Turning 15 Webtoons Into Anime

Webtoon anime adaptations are about to become a regular part of the anime calendar. On October 8, 2026, at New York Comic Con, the anime company HAYATE, WEBTOON's Japanese arm LINE Digital Frontier and Crunchyroll announced a partnership to develop anime for "around 15" WEBTOON series. The first is The Remarried Empress, coming in 2027, with Teenage Mercenary and The Boxer also in the works. All three companies are tied to Sony or WEBTOON, and the result will stream exclusively on Crunchyroll in select regions. Here's what that means, and why it's happening now.

What Is the Hayate x Crunchyroll Webtoon Deal?

It's a three-way production pipeline. According to the joint press release, the companies will "join forces from the development stage on potential anime adaptations of around 15 select titles." Every title comes from LINE Digital Frontier's app. LINE Digital Frontier runs LINE Manga, which it calls Japan's No. 1 digital comic service by cumulative downloads, and it is a subsidiary of WEBTOON Entertainment.

HAYATE is the newest piece. It was founded in March 2025 as a joint venture between Aniplex (the Sony Music company behind Demon Slayer's anime) and Crunchyroll, with staff from both. Aniplex's Masanori Miyake is chairman and CEO, and Leo Watanabe is president. HAYATE's whole purpose is to plan and produce anime for Crunchyroll's global audience. In April 2026 it bought the studio Lay-duce, whose Please Excuse My Younger Brothers is streaming on Crunchyroll this season, and it is also producing the Ghost of Tsushima: Legends anime.

"Around 15 titles" is a development slate, not 15 confirmed anime. Only three have been named, and none of them is a brand-new kind of project.

Can a Webtoon Become an Anime?

Yes, and it already has several times. A webtoon is a digital comic made to be read by scrolling down on a phone, usually in full color, and most of the big ones are Korean (manhwa). Anime is Japanese animation. Turning one into the other means a Japanese studio redraws a vertical, scrolling comic as a TV series, which is exactly what these shows did:

The first three were part of a 2020 push between Crunchyroll and WEBTOON, so this new deal is round two of an old partnership. The difference is scale and control. In 2020, the shows went to different studios one by one. Now there's a dedicated Sony company, HAYATE, building a slate. And the breakout hit, Solo Leveling, proved how big a webtoon anime can get. Solo Leveling comes from KakaoPage, WEBTOON's biggest rival, so it falls outside this deal.

So which webtoons are actually confirmed for HAYATE's slate?

Which Webtoons Are Getting Anime Adaptations?

Three titles were part of the New York Comic Con announcement:

• The Remarried Empress (new announcement, 2027). Empress Navier accepts her husband's demand for a divorce and asks to remarry Heinrey, a prince of the Western Empire. The webtoon by Alphatart (story) and Sumpul (art), based on Alphatart's web novel, has run on Naver WEBTOON since October 2019. Tetsuya Yanagisawa directs at TROYCA, with series composition by Akiko Inoue, character designs by Jun Nakai and music by Yuki Fukazawa. The cast: Yoko Hikasa as Navier, Ryohei Kimura as Heinrey and Tomoaki Maeno as Sovieshu.
• Teenage Mercenary (announced earlier). It got a new teaser visual and promo video at the panel.
• The Boxer (new announcement). Only a promo video so far, with no year or studio named in the press release.

The other 12 or so titles haven't been named. Because they all come from LINE Digital Frontier's catalog, the most likely picks are popular WEBTOON series with an English edition already out, since Crunchyroll's audience is mostly outside Japan.

The bigger question is why Sony is betting on Korean comics at all.

Why Does Sony Want Webtoons?

Because the money in anime has moved overseas, and webtoons already have readers there. The press release cites the Association of Japanese Animations: the anime market hit a record $25.36 billion in 2024, up 14.8%, and markets outside Japan grew 26.0% to $14.33 billion, more than Japan's $11.03 billion. A Crunchyroll-commissioned survey of about 29,000 people in seven countries found that 44% of those aged 13 to 54 call themselves anime fans, rising to 54% among Gen Z.

WEBTOON brings the other half: about 155 million monthly active users in more than 150 countries and regions. A webtoon with a large English readership is an anime with a fan base waiting before episode 1 airs. That lowers the risk, the same logic behind adapting popular manga and light novels.

LINE Digital Frontier had already been pushing in this direction. According to Anime News Network, it produced 12 adaptations of its webtoons in 2024, up from one in 2022 and two in 2023, and its CEO said in February 2025 that it would make 20 animated adaptations that year. Now it has Sony's production and distribution machine behind it.

For Sony, it's another piece of a very large anime business. Our explainer on Crunchyroll Storyworks and Sony's anime empire shows how Crunchyroll, Aniplex, HAYATE and Lay-duce fit together.

Will Webtoon Anime Be on Crunchyroll?

Yes. Under the deal, Crunchyroll "will exclusively stream the resulting anime in select territories." The press release doesn't list the territories, so availability in your country may differ, and Japanese TV broadcasts are a separate question. Release dates beyond The Remarried Empress's 2027 window haven't been announced.

Kairo's Take: 8 Webtoons That Deserve an Anime Next

This is a wish list for any studio, not only HAYATE: not every pick below is on LINE Manga, so some would need a different deal.

If Hayate was looking for its next big slate of webtoon adaptations, here are eight titles that absolutely deserve the screen treatment:

First up is Webtoon Character Na Kang Lim, a fully finished story that serves as both a brilliant trope parody and a genuinely compelling journey with great character arcs. For something totally different, Miss Pendleton offers a rare Regency romance fix, capturing that classic vibe you usually only find in works like Emma or Downton Abbey.

On the action front, The Extra's Academy Survival Guide balances survival mechanics, magic academy combat, and romance seamlessly, while The Spark in Your Eyes brings a deeper, drama-focused lens paired with incredible action sequences. If you want pure entertainment, The Greatest Estate Developer delivers comedy out the wazoo and is tailor-made for animated comedy.

For unique takes on established genres, I Became the Villain the Hero Is Obsessed With taps into current superhero trends with a fun, obsessive dynamic, and I Killed the Main Player delivers a completed, high-octane narrative backed by stellar character writing. Finally, My Bias Gets on the Last Train stands out in the romance space by focusing on college/young adult life rather than the standard high school backdrop.

For more on the business behind your favorite shows, read how anime studios make money and why studios are going bankrupt in a boom, or browse all our industry news.

Sources: HAYATE, LINE Digital Frontier and Crunchyroll press release (deal, titles, AJA and survey figures, WEBTOON user numbers), Anime News Network (HAYATE background, Lay-duce, LINE Digital Frontier adaptation numbers), AniTrendz (The Remarried Empress staff and cast), Crunchyroll Fall 2026 lineup (Please Excuse My Younger Brothers). Cover: Navier character visual for The Remarried Empress anime, image via the official site. Images ©Alphatart, SUMPUL, HereLee, MSTORYHUB/LDF, The Remarried Empress Animation Project.