The Sanrio Character Ranking is a popularity voting event for Sanrio characters. This annual fan voting event celebrates its 40th anniversary in 2025.
In this issue, we will look back on the ranking’s history and introduce some memorable events and how the ranking has evolved.
Join us as we trace the history of the Sanrio Character Ranking.

The Sanrio Character Ranking officially began in 1986, but its roots go back much further.

The origin of this contest was the "Sanrio Character Popularity Contest" held in 1975-76 by The Strawberry News, an in-house newspaper that delivered the latest information on Sanrio characters and goods to fans. It was a small contest with only 10 characters entered. At that time, there were also various other popularity contests, such as the "Popular Product Contest" and the "Popular Greeting Card Contest.”

Then, after a nine-year hiatus, the character popularity contest was revived in 1985. On this occasion, the characters selected as the top 3 decorated the covers of The Strawberry News.

From left to right: Nya Nyi Nyu Nye Nyon in third place,
in second place, The Vaudeville Duo.
And first place, Tuxedosam.
Covers of The Strawberry News (all from 1985)

In 1986, the official name of the contest was finally decided, and the Sanrio Character Ranking was launched. The voting method was by postcard, and the editorial office of The Strawberry News received a whopping 31,386 votes.

In the first edition, along with the main popularity vote, there was also a "Blast from the Past" Character Popularity Poll. This was a category to bring characters who had been on the sidelines for a while back into the spotlight and revive them.
Bunny & Matty and Patty & Jimmy were among the entries, and the first place went to Tiny Poem.

Tiny Poem

Here are the characters who have won the ranking so far, divided into topics.

Cover of The Strawberry News (1986)

The first ranking in 1986 had 43 characters entered. Among them, the memorable first place was awarded to Zashikibuta!
After being crowned first place, he appeared on the cover of The Strawberry News and on a poster, attracting a lot of attention.

Here are the winning characters since then:
The 2nd year (1987) winner was Marroncream.
The 3rd and 4th (1988, 1989) years it was Minna no Tabo.
The 5th year (1990), Kerokerokeroppi.

From left: Covers of The Strawberry News from 1991 and 1995.

From the 6th (1991) to the 10th (1995) year, Pochacco achieved an unprecedented record of five consecutive wins!

Here are the winning characters since then:
The 11th year (1996) winner was Bad Badtz-Maru.
The 12th (1997) year was Pompompurin (Newcomer Award & First Prize in his first year entering the ranking!).

From left: Covers of the Strawberry News from 1998 and 2009

From the 13th year (1998) to the 24th (2009), Hello Kitty won first prize for an unbelievable 12 consecutive years for the first time! Thereafter, the first prize alternated between My Melody and Hello Kitty.

25th and 26th year (2010, 2011), My Melody (two-time consecutive winner)
27th and 28th year (2012, 2013), Hello Kitty (two-time consecutive winner)
The 29th year winner was (2014) My Melody.

From left: Covers of The Strawberry News from 2016 and 2018

Since 2015, dog characters have made their presence felt.

30th and 31st years (2015, 2016), Pompompurin won for two consecutive years.
32nd and 33rd years (2017, 2018), Cinnamoroll won for two consecutive years.
34th year (2019), Hello Kitty stole the crown.
35th-39th (2020-2024), Cinnamoroll won for five consecutive years.

As we have shown, there have been 10 characters selected for the first prize so far. We look forward to seeing what characters will win the ranking in the future.

In order to be enjoyed by more people, the Sanrio Character Ranking has gradually evolved with the times. Here are some of the major topics.

Voting methods evolve, allowing voters to vote from abroad
2010: Web voting begins.
2012: English website launched　
2021: In addition to English, foreign language sites became available in simplified and traditional Chinese, German, French, Italian, Spanish, Portuguese, and Korean.　

Partner category as an additional feature was also launched.
2013: "Sanrio Character Ranking Collaboration Category " (now the Sanrio Character Ranking Partner Category) launched.
*This category is for entries in which Sanrio characters partner with characters from other companies, local governments, etc.

Various voting styles unique to that year were also available!
2014: Final-stage format following group qualifying
The 100 characters were divided into five groups, and preliminary voting was held for each group (pairings were drawn by lotto). The top four characters in each group (20 characters in all) advanced, and the first prize was determined by the number of votes cast in the final stage.

2016: "Naderu Vote," in which users "stroke" characters with their smartphones, became available.
The total cumulative stroking time was more than 3 years and 282 days! Pompompurin, ranked first, was petted for approximately 4,605 hours.

Did you know that the Sanrio Character Ranking has a "theme" for each year to make the characters more appealing and enjoyable? Here is a selection of some of the most impressive themes.

That year, each of the 100 characters made a "pledge of commitment" to do something! The unique efforts, such as riding in a wrapped bus that looked like a campaign car to make an appeal, became the talk of the town.

Hello Kitty won first place that year. Her "pledge" was If she won first place, she wanted to give fans a big HUG and she actually traveled around the country for a year to deliver hugs to many fans.

In keeping with Sanrio's vision "One World, Connecting Smiles.", the Sanrio Character Ranking was intended to be a place where everyone could smile.

The theme for the 40th anniversary in 2025 was "Jump to the Future With You!”
Characters jump toward the future in this energetic design. May the Sanrio Character Ranking continue to take off and spread smiles and happiness from Sanrio to the world... This is the guiding philosophy of this project.

The Sanrio Character Ranking will continue to evolve its themes and content so that not only those who look forward to it every year, but also first-time voters and participants from around the world, can experience the charm of the characters, and in order for the ranking to continue to deliver countless smiles.

©︎ 2026 SANRIO CO., LTD.

*This article is a re-edited version of the May 2, 2025 article.