15 Romance Anime NOT Set in High School

Romance not about puberty-drunken teens is an elusive beast for the discerning romance anime fan of a certain age.

As you grow out of your tender youthful years, you yearn for the relatablity of mature romance that is not set amidst a backdrop of a classroom. Perhaps you wish to see how physicality in a relationship affects things, maybe you want to see how the stresses of being an adult affect how people connect to each other, or maybe you just want a sweet fantasy background where high schools literally don’t exist.

Regardless of what fuels your desire for romance anime not set in high school, your do have some more mature – or at least diversely located – romance anime options.

Best Romance Anime Not Set in High School

Natsuyuki Rendezvous

You want maturity? Natsuyuki Rendezvous has it in spades. It also happens to be one of the more rare romance anime to acknowledge widows.

Natsuyuki Rendevous follows a romance between a guy that has a crush on a widowed flower shop owner, and whose efforts to grow closer to her are being blocked by the ghost of her dead husband.

The series deals with a lot of emotional pain and feelings of guilt for moving on, but it is a nice love story that doesn’t lean all over the tropes. Instead, it tackles new love, old love, and grief all very well.

Wotakoi: Love is Difficult for an Otaku

Wotakoi is an adult romance about, primarily, two office workers. One is a secret fujoshi and the other is a avid gamer, both who were childhood friends that reunited after discovering they work in the same office as adults.

After reconnecting, they decide to try dating each other in what is perhaps the most nonchalant start to a relationship in all romance anime.

The romance in Wotakoi starts off much like real dating can in any scenario – two people who have similar hobbies talking about those hobbies. It then progresses into genuine feelings.

However, the most interesting thing about Wotakoi, other than being an otaku romance anime, is that it follows the relationships of multiple couples in a unique way. You have the main couple in their new relationship, a side couple in a long-term relationship, and two cute college kids realizing they like each other.

Recovery of an MMO Junkie

Frustrated with work life, Moriko quits her job and retreats to become a shut-in NEET. In her new life, she takes up playing an MMO where she meets a player that she befriends. Little does she know, she actually has a real life encounter with this online friend that starts the sparks of romance.

The situation becomes complicated as she plays a male avatar and he plays a female avatar. If you are a long-time romance anime fan, you know where this sort of wacky misunderstanding is headed.

However, what Recovery of an MMO Junkie lacks in super cute romantic moments, you get back in spades through Moriko’s relatable female weeb behavior.

Spice and Wolf

Spice and Wolf is an excellent, but admittedly slow-building romance. Spice and Wolf is very much a fantasy series that is more dedicated to narrative and world building over producing “squee-worthy” romance moments.

While you will learn more about medieval economics than you probably ever wanted to know, Spice and Wolf introduces a flirty, building romantic relationship between a goddess and her human merchant traveling companion.

Where this pair go, chaos follows.

Snow White With The Red Hair

Snow White With The Red Hair is one of those series where the characters are young enough that, were this the real world, they would probably be in high school. However, this is not the real world, and no body has time for schooling in the midst of medieval fantasy toil.

Snow White With The Red Hair is the love story between a non-heir-apparent prince and a girl fleeing a lusty prince in her home kingdom. It is a sort of fairy tale romance, yes, but what is so lovely about it is that the main female has motivations beyond just landing herself a man. She has a profession and professional goals too.

Nana

Nana is a romance drama anime built on a foundation of cute coincidences.

Two girls, both named Nana, meet on the train to Tokyo. Coincidentally, they both put in offers to rent the same apartment, and compromise on splitting it as roommates. One is a punk rock musician, the other is a naive young girl looking for love.

Aside from also having a wonderful soundtrack – due to all the rock music – Nana is also a poignant tale of the many loves one can have. Love that is are good for you, and love are wrong in all the right ways.

Nana is a messy, emotional tale about two different girls trying to make their own ways in a rough city.

Nodame Cantabile

Nodame Cantabile is a music anime with a strong emphasis on romance. Think Your Lie in April, but with less tragedy and about college-aged adults.

What is marvelous about this series is that it isn’t all mushy romance moments between a budding couple, but it is about how the pair motivate each other on a professional level, too.

A good relationship features both parties supporting each other, after all.

Arakawa Under the Bridge

At a glance, Arakawa Under The Bridge is a “weird comedy anime about eccentric homeless people.” However, Arakawa Under The Bridge is not a series you can grasp from just a glance.

The strange comedy is prominent, and often what people enjoy the series for. However, the comedy hides both impressive social commentary as well as an increasingly touching romance between a homeless girl that claims to be an alien and a high-strung salaryman obsessed with not owing anything to anyone.

Rec

Rec is probably as close as you will get to a romance anime with a normal relationship. While Rec is still very much a drama, much of that drama stems from professional aspirations and disappointing realities.

Rec is easily overlooked because it doesn’t have an interesting hook that many romance anime need to employ when not telling high school stories.

Instead, you get a series about a guy stood up on a date who ends up going to the movies with a girl who told him not to waste the tickets he was about to throw away. Afterwards, they discover they live in the same neighborhood. They also discover that her apartment burned down.

\While it become a surprise cohabitation romance anime, Rec does also cover the intricacies of a relationship that formed perhaps too fast.

Golden Time

The somewhat frustrating thing about Golden Time is that it is about college-aged students, but it often feels like they are high school students.

The nice thing is that very little of it takes place in the college. You rarely see them attending class. As such, it opens up the romance up to happen in other venues.

However, Golden Time is only for romance anime fans that have an appreciation for melodrama. It is very much a romance drama anime that goes extra hammy with the drama as it follows a amnesiac college student dealing with his new and old loves.

Honey and Clover

Similar to Golden Time, Honey and Clover college-based romance drama. However, this series is a bit more palatable for those that like more grounded character drama that doesn’t evoke quite the same level of eye-rolling.

In Honey and Clover, you have a mix of school struggles and life struggles with the romance messily intermingled in a group of friends. As they are all adults, it is nice to see characters dealing with professional/financial struggles as well as the relationship ones.

Sing “Yesterday” For Me

There is a moment for many when they graduate school a newly-minted adult where they have literally no idea what they are supposed to do next. Some have professional goals that they pursue, others just kind of get a job that allows them to live and figure things out.

Sing “Yesterday” For Me follows a main character who chooses the latter. It then expands its focus into a group of characters who are all adrift in various ways. While there is building romance and romantic drama, Sing “Yesterday” For Me is often a poignant watch for those feeling a bit adrift in their own life.

Maison Ikkoku

While one of the most overlooked anime adaptations of Rumiko Takahashi’s (Inuyasha, Ranma 1/2, Urusei Yatsura) series, Maison Ikkoku is a hidden gem. What’s more, you have likely seen the plot a few times already from other series that have been inspired by it.

In Maison Ikkoku, a guy moves into an apartment. It is full of weird, eccentric people, and he promptly decides to leave. Well, right up until he meets the pretty widowed manager, and decides to stay.

From there on, Maison Ikkoku is a classic mix of drama, comedy, and romance. Although it is done in Rumiko Takahashi’s signature meandering sort of way.

Tonikawa – Over The Moon For You

They might look like two moe potatoes that belong in a high school classroom, but Tonikawa is actually about fully-grown adults. Even more rare, it is a romance anime about married adults.

Now, marriage might be the punctuation to a romance story, but in Tonikawa, it is the first episode. The series follows a boy who meets a girl, and promptly gets hit by a bus crossing the street to talk to her. In his post-accident haze, he asks her to marry him, she agrees, and disappears.

However, she turns up later with their marriage registration, and they start their life together as married strangers.

Now, that is a perfectly respectable start to drama, but Tonikawa is not a drama anime. In fact, it is the anti-drama romance anime. Tonikawa is all about these two getting to know each other, growing closer as a couple, and building a life together – all done with the most sugary-sweet wholesome veneer.

Maoyu – Archenemy and Hero

A little trick to find good, often more mature romance anime that escape the confines of the classroom is to look for fantasy romance anime. Maoyu is unique in that it offers both a satisfying fantasy story as well as a satisfyingly cute romance between adults.

Maoyu starts in a familiar way. The hero destined to defeat the Demon Lord rushes into their castle to fight, and is promptly asked to start dating the Demon Lord, who turns out to be a cute girl that wants to end the war between their two worlds.

From there, you get a cute moments of romance, but Maoyu often focuses more on its actual plot, which is making economic and political improvements to various countries that are propped up by the forever-war with the demons.

Do you have any more good romance anime recommendations that are not set in high school? Let fans know in the comments section below