A cool breeze is blowing, but it is not the winds of winter, it is the winds of kuudere. Unlike tsunderes that hide their dere, lovey-dovey side behind fiery hostility, the kuudere maintains their cold, emotionless facade near-exclusively. They may seem apathetic and generally uncaring, but often they actually care a lot. Typically the realm of emotionally damaged, kuudere girls are often the most caring of all the dere types.
Best Kuudere Anime Girls
What is a Kuudere?
Chances are that if you are here, you came here looking for a kuudere girl to fall in love with and already know what one is. However, if nothing else, knowing what we think defines a kuudere character can help you be more familiar with our criteria for choosing them.
“Kuudere,” by definition, is a portmanteau of “kuuru,” a katakanization of the English word “cool,” and “deredere,” meaning loving. These kuudere are often characters that are confident without being cocky and always in control of their emotions.
In extreme cases, they may appear emotionless. However, in many cases, a kuudere just keeps their cool and maintains their feelings until the proper time comes to express them. That said, even the coolest character may have a few specific buttons one can press to completely make them lose their cool.
Looking For More Dere?
Julie Sigtuna from Absolute Duo
As a princess, characters of nobility like Julia are expected to have a certain amount of grace. As such, a kuudere personality works well. However, the combination of being reserved, shy, and having herself a good old-fashioned sad backstory seems like building too big of a wall of ice.
However, just because Julia doesn’t have a ton of fire when it comes to emotion, she still takes the time to show her innate kindness in moments when it counts.
Ranko Mannen from Akiba Maid War
As the cold, calm, deep running waters of Ranko are the complete antithesis of a warm and cheerful maid working in a cafe, that is part of where the comedy in Akiba Maid War comes from. The other part coming from maid cafes acting like yakuza families.
Ranko is what you would expect from a strict military woman, not a maid. However, despite that, she takes the creed of a maid very seriously and any emotion she has will come out when someone challenges that.
Isuzu Sento from Amagi Brilliant Park
Given her extra cute and kind of perky appearance, Sento doesn’t really look the part of a kuudere, but its the personality that counts.
Sento is as stoic as it come, and with a certain bluntness that catches people off guard. However, you also get moments that show that she is incredibly sensitive, but simply lacks the social skills to appropriately express her emotions.
Reina Aharen from Aharen-san is Indecipherable
Aharen-san is Indecipherable is notable for being a rom-com where the two leads are kuudere characters. Raido is the strong silent type in an effort to seem cool while Reina is more the silent type because she doesn’t talk loudly.
It makes their antics surprisingly adorable, and because a kuudere can understand a kuudere, it becomes a surprisingly low drama romance with actual progression.
Tokaku Azuma from Akuma no Riddle
While Akuma no Riddle is all about a classroom full of assassins charged with killing another student in return for a wish if they succeed, you can expect some coldness to the characters. However, what you get is often various degrees of eccentricity.
Azuma is more your standard assassin archetype. She is cold, calculating, and talented. However, this series is all about her developing feelings – both in general and for her target.
Mei Aihara from Citrus
Citrus plays out the oft-used romance trope of opposites attract. Yuzu is girly and friendly, Mei is the classic Japanese beauty and often as cool as a mountain stream. However, underneath those still waters is a surprisingly sexually aggressive girl who often is the one to initiate things.
Unlike many kuudere girls who are cold on the exterior and squishy soft just past that, it takes a bit more digging to get to Mei’s soft side.
Lucy from Cyberpunk Edgerunners
Even in the world of Cyberpunk where people can augment themselves to be whatever they want, everyone still loves a mysterious, quiet beauty. That’s what Lucy is, she is elusive and difficult to get to know, but like David, you want to know her.
While Lucy remains cool and even lightly mysterious the whole way through the series, you do get to see her with that kuudere shell broken off, but only once.
Urara Shiraishi from Yamada-kun and the Seven Witches
Shiraishi is a rather interesting kuudere example. Unlike most kuuderes on this list that are more “icy” in personality, Shiraishi is actually quite warm when people talk to her, but still to the point and low on expressive emotion.
She is often the more logical and grounded person in this series of big personalities, which actually makes her growing feelings over the series more impactful.
Rui Tachibana from Domestic Girlfriend
As Domestic Girlfriend details a normal guy having to choose between his two new stepsisters that he both has various degrees of romantic interest and history with, it seems very fitting to give the sisters completely opposite personalities.
Whereas her sister is a more mature and friendly adult, Rui is a reserved teenager. However, the sheer fact that she still goes after someone very clearly in love with her sister makes her feelings pretty clear. She is a woman that shows how she feels with action, rather than words.
Inori Yuzuriha from Guilty Crown
Now there is nothing wrong with a kuudere as a main female lead. There are a few of them on here, but Inori, in my opinion, is a kuudere done poorly.
Inori is so closed off with her emotions, opinions, and general feelings that it kind of makes her not even a character. There is really no reason other than liking her music and superficial appearance for the main character to develop deep feelings for her.
This is the difficulty of creating a kuudere character. If you make them too lacking in expression and dialogue, they mind as well not be in the series.
Takina Inoue from Lycoris Recoil
As Lycoris Recoil is about teenager soldiers that covertly handle threats to Japan dressed as school girls, you would expect some seriousness to them.
You would expect characters like Takina.
She is every bit the soldier – serious and efficient, but not completely bound by orders like the normal archetype.
In the series, she is paired with someone completely her opposite, and shown that there is more to her life and her job than just doing things the most deadly and efficient route. As she is such a kuudere, it often makes her an effective tool for comedy.
Pawoo Nekoyanagi from Sabikui Bisco
While Pawoo is a woman of action, and is often pretty intense about that, in most battles she is never not in control of that bubbling rage. She is more the cool battle beauty who is dedicated to protecting the people under her charge.
She is pretty much proof that you can be a kuudere, but also kind of a brute at the same time.
Mero Furuya from Sankarea
Weird that in a show about having a zombie girlfriend the most emotionless one is the main characters very human and very alive little sister.
Mero is a typical kuudere side character who is there for occasional appearance and sometimes a little off-handed snark. However, as she misses her deceased mother, she is actually very lonely and still in mourning.
You get a few moments of her seeming like a normal happy child, and even breaking that kuudere shell when her brother, her only real friend, is threatened.
Rachel Gardner from Angels of Death
As Angels of Death is about climbing a building where each floor is the domain of a twisted killer, Rachel, the main character, having a muted personality actually plays perfectly. Everyone around her is some form of twisted, and they throw those personalities at her, a girl whose personality is much like that of a brick wall.
She doesn’t care if she dies, and she isn’t really afraid in the face of what those killers have to offer. She just has memories that she wishes to recover.
Unlike other kuudere on this list, she takes a bit of a side trip on her way to the dere due to her past, but you get there eventually.
Violet Evergarden from Violet Evergarden
As Violet was taken young and taught to be more disposable weapon than soldier, emotions weren’t part of the package. In fact, emotions would have actively worked against what her handlers wanted her to be. As such, after the war is done and with her free from the battlefield, the series is all about her learning normal emotions like empathy and love.
As Violet learns about these things, her sheer demeanor makes things like her shedding a few tears incredibly impactful, because it is real tangible growth. She will be a kuudere throughout the series, but you watch her grow from little more than an object into an person.
Yukino Yukinoshita from My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU
Too often anime portrays kuudere women as kind of ice queens. You see the “kuu,” but they give the barest hints of “dere” that they need to even out their personality. What My Teen Romantic Comedy SNAFU does really well is it crafts Yukino into that classic high school ice queen, but displays her as a composed person that seems outwardly cold only from a distance. To those close to her that matter, they see that she genuinely cares.
Furthermore, this is a melting kuudere. The longer the series goes on, the more dere she gets.
Tomoyo Sakagami from Clannad
Tomoyo is a bit on the warmer side of kuudere. She used to be a violent woman who punished men for the sake of justice more akin to a standard issue tsundere, but wanted to change her image. So upon transferring, she stifled her violent tendencies and put on a cool veneer.
Now her new kuudere attitude gives off a distinct vibe of maturity, but you see that the right people can bring the violence back out in her.
Ai Enma from Hell Girl
Literally sending people to hell can be a bit taxing on the emotions, so it is probably a good thing that Ai doesn’t have many. Cool under even the most extreme circumstances, Ai is pretty exemplary of the kuudere brand and genuinely cares for her assistants.
Kuroyukihime from Accel World
Although passionate about her love for Aruta, when other people are looking at them, she is as cool as they come. You have to maintain a certain refined image when you are kuudere-type school idol.
No one ever said love as a kuudere was easy, did they?
Ritsu Kawai from The Kawai Complex Guide to Manors and Hostel Behavior
Shy and anti-social, Ritsu spends her time with her nose deep in her books. While oblivious and often seemingly uncaring, her kuudere attitude stems from not quite knowing how to connect or interact with others.
Noriko Sonozaki from Kiznaiver
Acting as the arbitrator of the Kiznaiver Program, a programs that links human pain, it is probably good that Noriko lacks regular human emotions. It would likely make it impossible for her to do the things she does. However, there might just be more to this kuudere than meets the eye…
Chizuru Hishiro from ReLife
Although highly intelligent, Hishiro doesn’t know how to interact with others. Her coldness is often a point of contention with others due to them confusing it with her thinking she is better than them.
However, as we discover through ReLife, this socially stunted girl just wants to make friends and cares about the friendships she does make deeply.
Akame from Akame ga Kill
After hellish assassination training, Akame’s emotions were stifled, if not killed off altogether. Despite being one of the best assassins in Night Raid and often seeming very uncaring, she cares deeply for the lives of her comrades.
Unfortunately, she is only rarely able to show it. There is little time for emotions on the battlefield, and grief is for later.
Ruri Gokou from Oreimo
Although displaying a slight tendency towards tsundere-ism for the main character, Ruri often maintains a pretty cool composure. However, as it is later discovered, she is sweet and tender in her feelings of love, but still handles rejection like a real kuudere.
Lelei La Lalena from Gate
Although Lelei is part of Gate’s main harem, it is her kuudere personality that often causes her to be overshadowed by the other girls. While she does focus on building her magical powers by combining magic theory with scientific theory, she is also quite focused on love, using being underestimated as a more studious kuudere to sneak past the other girls in order to vie for affection.
Minami Iwasaki from Lucky Star
Minami is the master of the poker face. While always looking cold and emotionless, her friend Yukata claims differently. Like many kuuderes, her cold attitude is only skin deep.
Akemi Homura from Madoka Magica
Ah, those piercing purple eyes feel like they cut right through you. And they might, if you happen to be Kyuubey! While Homura has always been shy, she has not always been so cold. It is a consequence of various circumstances that you discover as you watch the show.
Wait til you see her transcend kuudere-ism and dive into being a yandere in the Rebellion movies too.
Kanade Tachibana from Angel Beats
Seemingly cold and taking things way too literally, Kanade is often at odds with the bigger personalities in Angel Beats. While powerful and cold, she is kind.
In fact, she used to act like a normal girl until she closed herself off due to all her friends constantly moving on with happy school memories.
Yuki Nagato from The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya
Yuki is hard to read, but she loves to read! Very studious and never without a good book with her, she seems cold and uncaring to those around her, but there are brief acts of kindness throughout the series that suggest otherwise.
Shizuku Mizutani from My Little Monster
Shizuku is a hard-working student that just wants to study in order to reach her future goals. As such, she doesn’t really connect to people, or even try to, and that makes her come off as cold. However, for those that get to know her, they realize that while she is serious, she is also a great caring person.
Shiina Mashiro from The Pet Girl of Sakura Hall
Shiina is a brilliant artist, but unable to really take care of herself. While others try to build her self-sufficiency, they often give up because she just doesn’t seem to care.
While she seems cold, when it comes to her friends, she will go to great lengths to help them out in the ways that she can do, often pushing herself to the limit.
Mei Misaki from Another
Mei is a unique kuudere as her coldness is a result of her family situation and a unique numbing to her surroundings. When we first meet her, she had suffered the loss of someone close to her and was ignored by her class, something that she uses her cool attitude to cope with. However, even when things are resolved, she remains quiet and still very kuudere in the way she cares.
Rei Ayanami from Neon Genesis Evangelion
Rei is often cited as a kuudere originator. Detached and withdrawn, she still remains a piloting machine, something that is very much tied to her lack of emotions. However, throughout the series, we discover her softer side as it comes out for the emotional hot mess that is Shinji.
Mikasa Ackerman from Attack on Titan
Mikasa exemplifies both a Mary Sue and a kuudere. Great at anything she tries, she goes about it not with pride, but a cool composure that earns the great respect of her peers. Her cool attitude was brought about by her childhood, but that dere-ness in her was brought out by Eren. While she tries to show a sweetness to him, but it often falls on deaf ears and blind eyes.
Did we forget to include your favorite kuudere girl from anime? Tell us all about that cold and caring lady in the comments section below.
I’d strongly recommend to remove the major spoiler in the Akemi Homura section or at least warn the readers about it.
Oop, good catch! I’ve re-worded it to be more ambiguous and less spoiler-y.
Don’t forget Koneko from High School DxD