The Best TV Shows on NHK Educational TV

Every NHK Educational TV Show Ranked From Best To Worst

Stay up-to-date with over 20 of NHK Educational TV’s elite series, with our list refreshed for June 2025. Some of the best tv shows from NHK Educational TV include Prince Mackaroo and Uninhabited Planet Survive!, airing in 1998 and 2003 respectively. From 1998 through to 2025, NHK Educational TV has accumulated a diverse collection of over 20 television shows.

  • Motto! Majime ni Fumajime Kaiketsu Zorori
    Motto! Majime ni Fumajime Kaiketsu Zorori (2020)9.3

  • Butt Detective
    Butt Detective (2018)9.0

    A polite and meticulous super sleuth known as the Butt Detective solves a myriad of baffling mysteries, blowing raspberries in the face of crime.

  • Anne Shirley
    Anne Shirley (2025)8.8

    On the beautiful Prince Edward Island in Canada, an orphan named Anne Shirley is mistakenly sent to Green Gables, the home of Matthew and Marilla Cuthbert. They choose to adopt her anyway, as Anne finds friendship, love, and happiness in her new home. Come along for the story of a purehearted and imaginative girl growing up, leaving for college, and returning home a changed woman.

  • Major
    Major (2004)8.5

    Honda Goro the son of a famous baseball player loves nothing more than baseball itself. His biggest dream is to show his father that he can become the best pitcher in the world despite all the hardships he had to endure he keeps on running towards his goal at full speed.

  • Uninhabited Planet Survive!
    Uninhabited Planet Survive! (2003)8.2

    It is the 22nd century where anti-gravity and warp travel are commonplace. However, the green Earth only exists in history book, people live in space colonies instead. Luna is a transfer student whose parents passed away when she was young, leaving her alone with her robotic cat Chako. Her dream is to become space exploration expert like her parents. A mistake during a school trip strands her and six of her classmates on a seemingly uninhabited planet. Here she must lead the introvert Shaara, the mechanic expert Shingo, the quiet Kaoru, the spoiled Howard, the obedient Bell, and the prideful Menori in s battle for their survival.

  • To Your Eternity
    To Your Eternity (2021)8.2

    An immortal being takes on the form of a human boy, wandering the earth and experiencing the pains and joys of life throughout his story without end.

  • Bakuman
    Bakuman (2010)8.1

    Moritaka Mashiro, a high school student, is persuaded by his classmate, Akito Takagi, to become an aspiring manga artist when the latter realizes his natural talent as an artist. However, Moritaka is reluctant as his uncle, once an artist with his own manga, died from overwork. With Akito's help, Moritaka gets his school crush, Azuki Miho, who is an aspiring voice actress, to act in the anime adaptation of their future manga once it is completed. However, Mashiro also proposes to Azuki, who surprisingly accepts only on the condition she will marry him when both of them have achieved their dreams. With a goal set before him, Mashiro begins a long and struggling path to become a famous manga artist.

  • Sound! Euphonium
    Sound! Euphonium (2015)8.0

    After swearing off music due to an incident at the middle school regional brass band competition, euphonist Kumiko Oumae enters high school hoping for a fresh start. As fate would have it, she ends up being surrounded by people with an interest in the high school brass band. Kumiko finds the motivation she needs to make music once more with the help of her bandmates, some of whom are new like novice tubist Hazuki Katou; veteran contrabassist Sapphire Kawashima; and band vice president and fellow euphonist Asuka Tanaka. Others are old friends, like Kumiko's childhood friend and hornist-turned-trombonist Shuuichi Tsukamoto, and trumpeter and bandmate from middle school, Reina Kousaka. However, in the band itself, chaos reigns supreme. Despite their intention to qualify for the national band competition, as they currently are, just competing in the local festival will be a challenge—unless the new band advisor Noboru Taki does something about it.

  • Log Horizon
    Log Horizon (2013)7.7

    One day, while playing the online game Elder Tales, 30,000 players suddenly find themselves trapped in another world. There, eight-year veteran gamer Shiroe also gets left behind. The trapped players are still alive, but they remain in combat with the monsters. The players don't understand what has happened to them, and they flee to Akiba, the largest city in Tokyo, where they are thrown into chaos. Once proud of his loner lifestyle, Shiroe forms a guild called Log Horizon with his old friend Naotsugu, female assassin Akatsuki and others.

  • Aoashi
    Aoashi (2022)7.7

    Ashito Aoi is a young, aspiring soccer player from a backwater town in Japan. His hopes of getting into a high school with a good soccer club are dashed when he causes an incident during a critical match for his team, which results in their loss and elimination from the tournament. Nevertheless, he catches the eye of someone important who happened to be visiting from Tokyo. How will things turn out for Ashito?

  • Den-noh Coil
    Den-noh Coil (2007)7.3

    Den-noh Coil, Coil — A Circle of Children, is a Japanese science fiction anime television series depicting a near future where semi-immersive augmented reality technology has just begun to enter the mainstream. The series takes place in the fictional city of Daikoku, a hotbed of AR development with an emerging city-wide virtual infrastructure. It follows a group of children as they use AR glasses to unravel the mysteries of the half real, half Internet city, using a variety of illegal software tools, techniques, and virtual pets to manipulate the digital landscape. Den-noh Coil, in development for over a decade, is the series director debut of Japanese animator Mitsuo Iso. It premiered on NHK Educational TV on May 12, 2007. Due to the animators involved in its production and its unusually high-profile television broadcast time slot, Den-noh Coil was highly anticipated.

  • Phi Brain: Puzzle of God
    Phi Brain: Puzzle of God (2011)7.3

    Phi Brain: Puzzle of God is a 2011 Japanese anime television series produced by Sunrise. The first two series aired on NHK Educational TV between October 2011 and September 2012, with a third season to begin airing in October 2013. The series is directed by Junichi Sato with script supervision by Mayori Sekijima. Hajime Yatate, the collective penname for the creative staff at Sunrise, is credited with the original story. The anime has been licensed in North America by Sentai Filmworks. A manga adaptation by Yoshiki Togawa began serialization in Kadokawa Shoten's Newtype Ace magazine from November 2011. A PlayStation Portable video game by Arc System Works was released on May 31, 2012.

  • RADIANT
    RADIANT (2018)7.2

    Seth is a boy who seeks to become a great magician, and a group of witches who seek to travel to the Radiant. Radiant is a mythical land that spawns monsters called "Néméses" which fall to the world from the sky. While traveling, they are also hunted by The Inquisition.

  • Blue Orchestra
    Blue Orchestra (2023)7.0

    In the fall of his third and final year of middle school, Hajime Aono, a violin prodigy, stopped playing violin for his own personal reasons. But it was also that year when he got to know a girl who told him about a high school with a prestigious school orchestra. Suddenly, the gears in the clock of Aono's life began to turn again. This is the story of a youth drama that brings forth the harmony between music and the heart!

  • Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE
    Tsubasa RESERVoir CHRoNiCLE (2005)6.7

    Syaoran fights to gather the scattered soul of his beloved princess Sakura, whose memories were sent adrift across space and time.

  • Prince Mackaroo
    Prince Mackaroo (1998)4.0

    Prince Mackaroo, known in Japan as Ojarumaru, is a Japanese manga series created by Rin Inumaru and published by Shogakukan and serialized in Ciao in 1993. The manga was republished by Shueisha and re-serialized in Saikyo Jump in 2011. It was adapted as an ongoing anime series produced by Gallop and broadcast on NHK beginning in October 1998. As of today, The show has become the second longest-running anime on NHK next to Nintama Rantaro.

  • Auto Boy – Carl from Mobile Land
    Auto Boy – Carl from Mobile Land (2020)4.0

    Mobile Land is an island where vehicles live. Carl arrives on the island and starts working as a delivery boy. He delivers packages to all kinds of vehicles. Ruster sometime gets in the way and is always trying to turn everyone into rust, but Carl works hard at his deliveries.

  • A Masterpiece in 100 Minutes
    A Masterpiece in 100 Minutes (2010)N/A

    This program aims to decipher a challenging classic literary work over the course of four episodes lasting for a total of 100 minutes. Alongside clear explanations from skillful presenters, it utilizes animation, visual imagery, and readings to delve into the profound world of these renowned pieces.

  • Kenko Choice
    Kenko Choice (2013)N/A

  • Space Academy
    Space Academy (2021)N/A

    The story follows the daily life of Kotetsu-kun, who aspires to be an astronaut, and friends at the Animal Space Academy as they all pursue their dreams.