How to find out the name of an anime, drama, or series?

Want to find the name of an anime, drama, or series but don't know how? Often all that's left is an image or a vague memory of a scene. In this article, we share how to find it: image search, Akinator, databases, and the help of other fans.

There are several ways to find out the name of an anime: by image, music, character names, character traits, release year, and more. Although the focus is on anime, the strategies in this article also work for series, dramas, manga, and games.

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Discovering the name of the anime from an image

Usually, you want to find out the name of an anime when you come across an interesting image on social media, but no one mentions the title. There is more than one way to identify it from an image.

If you use the Google Chrome browser, right-click the image and choose Search with Google Lens. The results open in a sidebar with sites that cite the source of that image.

Browse the results until you find the name of the anime on one of the pages, or in the image description.

If you use another browser, go to Google Images and click Search by image to upload the picture. Lens works on most browsers, and many of them also offer an extension for this.

If you use Telegram, you can send the image to one of the bots below that perform the same function:

• @WhatAnimeBot identifies the anime, the episode, and the exact timestamp from a screenshot;
• @reversesearchbot finds the source of an image and can also recognize the character and the episode.

For screenshots taken from an episode, trace.moe is the most direct option: the site points to the anime, the episode, and the exact moment of the scene. For fan art and illustrations, SauceNAO finds the original source, which is often the artist's Pixiv profile.

Discovering the name of the anime with Akinator

Another way to discover the name of an anime, series, or movie, or even the name of a character, is Akinator. If you vaguely remember the character, just answer the questions and see what it guesses.

Akinator is a website where a genie asks questions to guess the character you are thinking of, and it learns from the answers of previous players. Usually, it displays the name of the character along with the name of the anime.

It may not mention the name of the anime. In those cases, just search for the character's name on Google. It can also end up being wrong sometimes if it is a very unknown character.

Discovering the name with little information

If you only have a little information about the anime, you may need a longer search on databases like MyAnimeList and Wikipedia.

I remember that as a child I used to listen to a song whose name I didn't know. At 16, I still had no idea what it was called, but I really wanted to find out.

I couldn't find the name of the song from its lyrics because I remembered the chorus and the lines wrong. I only knew that the song had been performed at Nickelodeon's Kids' Choice Awards.

I searched year by year on the Wikipedia pages of the Kids' Choice Awards until I found the name of the song: Hey Ya!, by Outkast. It was a great satisfaction to finally learn its name. Japanese music is a big part of what I listen to, and my playlist of Japanese songs and anime shows it.

If you know the year the anime was released, you can filter MyAnimeList by year or season. If you remember the studio, look it up on the studio's Wikipedia page or search by genre.

Any information you have can be relevant to finding the name of the anime, series, or drama. Almost every title has a database entry with details you can filter, whether by year, studio, or genre. For dramas, the equivalent of MyAnimeList is MyDramaList.

I have found anime names just by typing a few characteristics into Google, and it might work for you too. Searching in English widens the results, since most databases and forums are in that language.

Ask for help in an online community

Today it is easy to find out the name of an anime, series, or drama. If none of the previous options helped, just ask for help in online communities, social media groups, and forums.

I noticed that many people turn to communities like r/whatanime and r/findananime on Reddit, or to the forums of MyAnimeList and MyDramaList. Describe what you remember: characters, scenes, the year, the studio. No matter the case, never give up on finding the work you are looking for but can't remember.

I hope the tips in this article are enough to help you find the name of an anime or series that you have forgotten. In most cases, one small detail is enough to start the search.

Do you know a trick that isn't in the article? Leave it in the comments so other readers can find their forgotten anime too.