Isekai anime is a big popular genre now, and the singular tenant on what makes an isekai anime an “isekai” is that a character gets reincarnated or transported to a new world.
However, while the term “isekai” does indeed translate into “another world.” They don’t need to be sent to the same boilerplate medieval fantasy world with kemonomimi for a world to seem vastly foreign to them.
I am of a mind that “another world” is “another world” even if it is the same world, but rendered dramatically changed by time. This means if you are reborn several hundred years later or transported several hundred years into the past, it still counts as an isekai.
If you want anime recommendations where the main character was reincarnated into their original world or was otherwise transported to a dramatically different time period of that same world, then give these anime series a try.
Best “Reborn in the Same World” Isekai Anime
Reborn to Master The Blade: From Hero-King to Extraordinary Squire
For as many isekai anime that feature the main character being born as the start of their life in a new world, you would think more would nod at there being equal chance that they would be born the opposite gender. And yet, only Reborn to Master The Blade has dared to do so.
This series follows a legendary hero-king who built an empire. On his deathbed, his only regret is that being a leader kept him from training to be a better warrior. So when a goddess reincarnated him, he decides to fully commit himself to being a warrior, even after being reborn a woman.
It is actually pretty fun to watch him constantly dodge “main character” opportunities in his world that would see the responsibilities of leadership placed on their shoulders in order to be a hardcore battle maniac instead.
The Strongest Sage With The Weakest Crest
Isekai anime is always so helpful because it so often puts the core concept if not the entire plot right in the title. Such is the case with The Strongest Sage With The Weakest Crest.
In this series, everyone is born with a crest that dictates their abilities. The main character had strong magical capabilities, and when he reached the pinnacle of his crests’ abilities, he lamented that he didn’t have a different crest.
He uses his skills to reincarnate and essentially re-roll his crest. However, in the far future he was reincarnated into, he discovers that demons had slandered the crest he desired as horribly weak. Of course, he shows that things are quite the opposite.
Nobunaga Concerto
Being sent back to Feudal Japan and meeting Oda Nobunaga is more common in anime than you would expect. However, Nobunaga Concerto shakes things up by having a modern Japanese kid being sent back to the Feudal era, meeting a sickly Nobunaga, and ending up taking his place.
This series is an interesting mix of the kid learning how to act like he belongs in the era, but using his modern day knowledge to thrive in it as this legendary warlord.
The Misfit of Demon King Academy
What does one do when they reach the pinnacle of their ambition?
In the Misfit of Demon King Academy, the demon king has succeeded in conquering the world as the strongest being. However, what is left to do at the top? Being bored, he sets his mind to dying and reincarnating into the future of his world.
Once there, he discovered that the world peace brought about by his conquest has caused magic to wane significantly in the present era. This means the magical abilities he possesses effectively makes him still the strongest.
The Ambition of Oda Nobuna
If anime is sending characters back in time, already leaning on the suspension of disbelief, they mind as well have fun with it, right? The Ambition of Oda Nobuna certainly has some fun – in this case, gender-bending all your favorite Feudal Japanese warlords.
Why have feudal Japanese warlords be more respected and vastly cooler than the average main character you transport in time when you can make them women that you can put in ecchi situations instead?
Battle Girls: Time Paradox
You know how I mentioned above that The Ambition of Oda Nobuna was about a normal guy sent back to Feudal Japan, but all the famous warlords were women that got into ecchi situations?
What if Battle Girls was that, but more ecchi and less interesting? Because that’s what you get.
The women are a little more intense in personality, a little less dressed, and it has a little more ambition in its plot, but doesn’t pull it off well.
The Greatest Demon Lord is Reborn as a Typical Nobody
There are more than a couple anime series on this list about the very strongest being in the world deciding to die so they can reincarnated into the future. However, The Greatest Demon Lord is Reborn as a Typical Nobody has more wholesome reasons than most.
His reasoning is that it is pretty lonely at the top.
When you are the strongest and most powerful, you don’t have a chance to make treasured friends. Everyone either wants to use your authority or your strength. So he decides to die and reincarnate as a normal dude to make some friends.
Of course, as this is anime, he is still born with magnificent power that he attempts to hide in order to not blow his chance to make real friends.
Ya Boy Kongming
In probably one of the more unique takes on this situation, Ya Boy Kongming follows that famous Chinese strategist Zhuge Liang who, on his death bed, wishes he could live in a more peaceful time in his next life.
When he wakes up, he is in his same body, but as a young man again. Furthermore, he is in modern Tokyo and finds himself swept up in the nightlife. In one nightclub, he hears a struggling songstress named Eiko sing and decides to use his strategic mind to make her a star!
If you enjoy both EDM and history, Kongming is an intoxicating mix. It is fun to watch him manipulate the music industry, and just fun to watch Kongming in general.
Gibiate
Gibiate follows the story of a select few warriors from the Feudal Era being pulled forward in time to a period in Japan where the human race is near extinction after a virus causes people to turn into monsters.
The concept of Gibiate is interesting – good, even – but this series doesn’t pull it off with as much finesse as it could have. It ends up riddled with problems, so best to temper expectations if the premise does indeed intrigue.
Inuyasha
It is debatable on whether you can call Inuyasha an isekai in this day and age where isekai follows almost a cookie-cutter pattern as it rolls out of the money-printing machine. However, there are many that consider Inuyasha one of the “isekai before isekai” anime series despite not technically leaving our world.
Inuyasha follows a modern Japanese schoolgirl who falls down a well and is transported to Feudal Japan. There she discovers that all the superstitious against demons in the modern day are apt as demons roam the lands in this dangerous era of history.
Events transpire that see her traveling with a handsome, yet grumpy half-demon in order to fix the mess she kind of created.
Dr. Stone
Dr. Stone, an isekai? In this specific circumstance, yes, Dr. Stone would indeed be an isekai.
In Dr. Stone, humanity is all petrified one day. For thousands of years, the world stopped until the right set of events were set into motion by nature to see a super genius exposed to the cure to that ailment. Once free, he sets his intellect into curing humanity and jump-starting civilization again.
Of course, as civilization crumbled over several hundred years, the world they wake up to is not the world they left. Animals run wild, nature long reclaimed every structure, and most knowledge was lost. It is Earth, but Earth like no one else knew it.
7 Seeds
If Dr. Stone was stretching the boundaries of this special definition of isekai anime, then 7 Seeds will continue doing just that to the point where the big dorks that like to argue about the arbitrary definition of isekai are probably frothing wildly at the mouth.
Like Dr. Stone, 7 Seeds follows a series of teams that were cryogenically frozen for hundreds of years after an extinction-level event wiped out humanity. The modern world they came from has ended, and even the flora and fauna they once knew has changed, making the Earth more dangerous to survive in than ever.
While they were not the only project put into motion to preserve the human race, part of the more devastating arcs of the series is them discovering how the other measures failed miserably.
Do you know more isekai anime recommendations where the main character is transported or reincarnated into the same world? Let fans know in the comments section below.
