While romance can bloom from literally anywhere, romance anime only has a select number of set ups to make a compelling romantic story. One such set up is where the popular person goes against all odds and begins to take an interest in their local outcast.
While it may seem a bit insulting that an unpopular person can often only find value when someone more valuable takes interest in them, it is better to think of it as every introvert needs an extrovert to pull them out of their shell sometimes, you know?
If this lovely romantic set up between a popular person and an unpopular person is your jam when it comes to romance anime, then give these anime recommendations a try.
Best Romance Anime Where a Popular Person Loves an Outcast
Say “I Love You”
After a bad history of betrayal by her classmates, Mei now remains quiet and unapproachable at school to protect herself. However, one day a misunderstanding crosses her path with the popular Yamato. Finding her intriguing, he tries to get closer to her despite her constantly pushing him away.
This series is most quintessentially this romance anime set up. Don’t expect any subversion, do expect some standard romance anime drama. However, it does well to give every character some damage to them that affects their behavior.
Kimi ni Todoke
At this point, Kimi ni Todoke is notable for being pretty slow with its romance. However, the entire series is all about a shy and misunderstood girl being one day encouraged to come out of her shell by a popular boy.
The nice thing about the series is that the popular boy inspired her, and likes her, but they don’t immediately become a couple. She is growing for herself and ultimately grows into a person that can have a normal relationship with a well-adjusted person rather than just clinging to them as their first and only friend.
3D Girlfriend
As your standard socially inept otaku, Tsutsui escapes his unpopularity in the real world through games and anime. However, being forced into pool cleaning punishment, he meets the beautiful and popular Iroha. He thinks she is just your standard vapid popular girl with a reputation for being loose, but despite her reputation, he ends up seeing her in a wholly different light.
While 3D Girlfriend starts off downright cringe-worthy sometimes, it develops into a pretty good romance over its run. It is a lovely adventure in not judging a book by its cover with both characters.
Horimiya
Hori, pretty and popular at school, has a relatively dead social life since she has to care for the house and her little brother while her parents work. Miyamura looks like a gross otaku at school but becomes a fashionable guy with tons of piercings outside of it.
One day, their paths outside of school cross.
Horimiya is a show about the faces of ourselves that we don’t show others and it builds a fantastic romance out of it. It has a story that has definitely been approached before, but cuts all the standard romance drama right out of it leading to relatively wholesome couple moments.
My First Girlfriend is a Gal
As a distinctly an ecchi romance, My First Girlfriend is a Gal has the whole plot summed up in the title.
A unpopular guy accidentally gets his first girlfriend who is a fashionable and popular gyaru, or “gal.”
However, while gyaru have the reputation of being a bit slutty, his new girlfriend is a gyaru in looks alone. She is as pure as snow when it comes to romance. Her friends pushing for her romantic progression, however, are not. Thus why it becomes ecchi.
My Dress-Up Darling
What is more bonding between two people of different statuses than shared passions? In My Dress-Up Darling, Wakana is a loner at school due to him thinking his passion for wanting to make Hina Dolls like his grandfather is not an appropriate passion for a man. However, after a chance encounter with the fashionable and popular Marin, he discovers that she wishes to cosplay, and cosplay a girl from an H-game at that.
Together, he helps her reach her goals while also finding her as a friend that really accepts his own passion. Her openness as an otaku further inspires him to be able to accept himself as well.
While the actual romance is pretty slow, it is a very cute progression.
Haruka Nogizaka’s Secret
Not unlike My Dress-Up Darling, Haruka Nogizaka’s Secret is about a main character who discovers that the most popular girl in school is secretly a giant otaku. Unlike My Dress-Up Darling, she hides it and he agrees to help keep the secret.
A shared secret is a quick way to form a bond, and a bond is the first step to a relationship. As an older show, this series is more aligned with a lot of rom-com tropes, but that’s not necessarily a bad thing.
Kotoura-san
Being shunned by family for her ability to read minds has made Kotoura cold. Now she actively remains unsociable to keep people from hurting her again.
However, when she transfers to a new school, she finds that Manabe isn’t put off by her coldness and actually finds her powers amazing.
While Manabe isn’t the most popular guy, Kotoura’s outcast status makes him look pretty good by comparison. Furthermore, this rom-com can be as touching sometimes as it is funny.
Brothers Conflict
Have you ever wanted to see a whole harem of handsome brothers fight over one girl that is also their new step-sister?
No? Well, too bad.
While Ema in Brothers Conflict isn’t unpopular per say, she isn’t really anything. She is a sweet anime girl cutout for her much more developed 13 new brothers to fall in love with and fight over. She isn’t shown to have any other friends or really a life outside of engaging in each brother characters’ arc.
Her brothers, of course, are all handsome and various stages of successful at their particular passions.
Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches
While trying to escape his reputation as a delinquent, Ryuu grows bored at his high school and soon develops a reputation as a delinquent again. However, one day he encounters a the beautiful honors student Shiraishi and accidentally ends up kissing her, discovering that upon kissing, they can switch bodies.
While this show has big harem vibes as it pursues its plot of uncovering all the witches with kiss-activated powers in their school, like every harem, there is a clear best girl. And, like most harems, it is the first girl.
Furthermore, this is a harem show where the romance actually does progress between a main couple by the end. So no protagonist being wishy-washy with his feelings here.
Don’t Toy With Me, Miss Nagatoro
Do you know that old saying that children bully people of the opposite gender because they like them and that’s the only way they know how to express it? Well, that is exactly this show.
The main character is quietly working on his art in the library one day before he becomes targeted by a group of popular girls. One girl takes more of an interest in him than the others and suddenly he is besieged with her company on a daily basis.
Because no one is honest with their feelings here, love moves slow. The teasing can seem on the criminal side at times, too. However, the longer it goes on and the softer things become, it actually becomes quite touching.
Kiss Him, Not Me
It is often hard to believe that someone popular just suddenly takes an interest in an unpopular person one day. This series has a set up grounded more in reality, even if that truth stings.
The main character is a chubby weeb girl who, after her favorite character of a series dies, stops eating, gets skinny in her bout of depression, and suddenly becomes cute. Now, of course a whole harem of handsome classmates are suddenly interested in her despite her still shipping them as boy’s love pairings.
At least this series had the good sense to make the main love interest the boy who liked her even before she got hot, so there’s that.
My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU
While many romance series do have plots outside of love that they follow, they aren’t always the most meaningful things. My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU is a rom-com of a different breed.
It focuses on a pessimistic, and thus widely unpopular, loner who is forced to join a club whose whole purpose is helping other students. This club is lead by an extremely popular but somewhat cold girl. While things start of strained at first, they both grow as people and eventually grow into a couple.
What I can say about this series will never do it justice. It is truly one of the best anime series of any genre at developing the characters throughout its seasons.
Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai
Much like My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU, Rascal Does Not Dream of Bunny Girl Senpai is a romance, but with a meaty side of plot to it. The main character is a quiet guy with only a small handful of friends, but he manages to save an extremely popular classmate and actress from disappearing due to the mysterious Puberty Syndrome.
While they get together as a couple rather early and have cute couple moments throughout, the series is dedicated to following the interesting and often dramatic mystery of Puberty Syndrome.
Komi-san Can’t Communicate
To the fair, Tadano is really only unpopular in this series specifically because of how close he gets to the extremely popular Komi.
This series tends to flip this particular romance trope on its head. Komi is shy and extremely quiet due to her social anxiety, but extremely popular because of her quiet dignity and beauty.
In another world, she might be an unpopular girl and Tadano, a wholly normally and well adjusted guy, would be the guy that draws her out of her shell.
Unfortunately, the romance in Komi-San Can’t Communicate is there, but it moves at an absolute snail’s pace.
Accel World
Chubby and frequently bullied, Haruyuki frequently finds his escape in online gaming. However, one day the popular vice president of the student council, Kurohimyuki, introduces him to a new type of augmented reality game that accelerates brain waves so quickly that time seems to stop.
Now, admittedly, Accel World dedicates a ton of time to following its plot surrounding Brain Burst and fighting their way to the top. So this is definitely a romance for those who also like a hearty dose of action with it.
However, the main character is unpopular, his love interest is super popular, and it does have some nice romantic moments. It just isn’t set like a standard rom-com where their relationship takes priority over everything else.
Oreshura
After watching love rip his family apart, Eita is determined to never get involved in it. This means his high school life is strictly for studying.
However, noticing his disinterest, the frequent target of other’s affections, Masuzu, asks him to be her boyfriend so everyone else will stop asking her out.
While this one starts as a fake romance, you know how these things go. It eventually turns into a real one as Eita’s eyes are opened to the joys of love.
Gamers
Usually when a popular girl finds out you are a gamer, they don’t immediately drag you to their gaming club, but that’s what Gamers is about.
After a chance meeting with the school’s idol, average student Keita is dragged to the gaming club, but while this club has a wide variety of gamer stereotypes, Keita doesn’t believe gaming should be competitive.
That said, Gamers, despite the title, is profoundly little about gaming. Instead is is more your standard rom-com.
Sankarea
Sakarea is admittedly a rather strange romance since it doesn’t technically start until the titular, popular Sanka Rea dies after growing tired of dealing with trouble at home.
However, she comes back to life as a zombie and it begins a relationship with the zombie-obsessed main character.
It is hard to blend horror, romance, and comedy into one series, but this series does a decent job.
Wotakoi
Most romances with this specific set up are relatively regulated to high school since, as and adult, no one really cares how popular you are.
However, Wotakoi is an adult romance notable because the main character Narumi is actively hiding her otaku hobbies out of fear of having yet more normal people pushing her away as a gross otaku. However, she reconnects with her childhood friend Hirotaka at her new job, a man who is quiet but openly games no matter what people think, and starts dating him.
Wolf Girl and Black Prince
Struggling to make new friends, Erika manages to snag the tenuous friendship of a few popular girls. However, trying to impress them, she lies about having a boyfriend.
Ending up snapping a photo of a handsome stranger as proof, she is shocked when the handsome boy goes to her school. Asking him to be her pretend boyfriend, he agrees on the condition that she be his dog. Despite this agreement, she finds herself actually falling in love with him.
My Love Story
While neither character in My Love Story is necessarily popular or unpopular, it is close enough to this set up to merit mentioning. Takeo is a large, intimidating gorilla of a man. While he earns admiration from his male peers for his strength and heroics, his sheer stature and face tend to push girls away.
However, after saving a cute girl from a molester, she falls in love with him. Even then, until it is spelled out, he thinks she is in love with his popular and handsome best friend.
This is perhaps one of the most wholesome romances you will ever watch.
Do you know of more romance anime recommendations where a popular person falls in love with an unpopular person? Let fans know in the comments section below.
