This 2026 Fantasy Anime Is A Must Watch For Harry Potter Fans
By Rafael MotamayorJuly 11, 2026 10:00 am EST
Fantasy anime is having a moment. Though the genre has always been a big part of anime, proper high fantasy as we know it in the West has been lacking for decades. Western-style fantasy isn’t exactly prevalent in Japanese culture. That’s why we’ve had few and far between high fantasy shows out of Japan. At most, we get genre-bending shows with fantasy elements, like “Dragon Ball” going from having dragons and dinosaurs to aliens and gods. That being said, there are some gems, like the ’90s fantasy anime based on a “Dungeons & Dragons” campaign, “Record of Lodoss War.”
But this is changing now. Right now we have “Delicious in Dungeon” doing some of the best world-building on television and combining it with a narrative straight out of dungeon crawler video games. We have “Frieren: Beyond Journey’s End” with a melancholic and methodical high fantasy epic perfect for “Lord of the Rings” fans
Now we have a new fantasy show, one that is considered part of the Big Three of fantasy anime, alongside “Frieren” and “Delicious in Dungeon.” It is also a must watch for fans of “Harry Potter,” a coming of age show with a fantastic and creative take on magic. The show is “Witch Hat Atelier,” which follows Coco, a young girl who loves magic. One day she accidentally becomes a witch apprentice after she turns her mom into stone. Now she must learn to use her powers correctly and also deal with the rise of a dark order of witches hoping to bring back forbidden spells and disrupt the magical world forever. It is clever, visually stunning, and one of the best shows of the year.
Witch Hat Atelier gives us a different kind of magical school
Crunchyroll
There are two main things that “Witch Hat Atelier” does really well that “Harry Potter” fans should appreciate. It delivers a fun and unique portrayal of spellcasting that prioritizes training and studying over determinism and elitism, while also giving a rather thoughtful view of a wizarding world that only has certain people with magic powers
Let’s start with the first point. As we learn in the very first episode, magic in the world of “Witch Hat Atelier” is not something you’re born with. Everyone has access to magic, it’s just gatekept from most people. This is a huge secret that holds the structure of the show’s wizarding world together. It also leads to some stunning spellcasting, which is here treated as a craft rather than a superpower. Even though most of “Harry Potter” is spent at school, the franchise barely scratched the surface of its power system and how it worked. How do wizards create spells? If the words used are all in Latin, can you just pick up a dictionary and know what to cast? How do flicks of the wrist affect your spellcasting — beyond that one guy constantly blowing himself up?
“Witch Hat Atelier,” meanwhile, is all about the intricate art of spellcasting. The show highlights the importance of the components needed and the quality of them, the meticulous movements required to cast a spell and how even a miniscule movement can result in a very different kind of spell. It makes the school aspect of the story much more engaging because it serves a purpose beyond just passing the time, it shows how the characters improve their skills
A story about changing the status quo
Crunchyroll
“Harry Potter” is a very pro status-quo franchise. One of its main flaws is that it never really questions, never alone challenges the way things are in wizard society, like the class divide, the eugenics, the divide between wizards and muggles. The books did try, briefly, with the Hermione house elves subplot, but that ultimately went nowhere — perhaps the HBO show will manage to fix it
“Witch Hat Atelier,” on the other hand, is all about changing the status quo and questioning the state of things. From the very beginning, it is clear that magic is a classist, elitist thing that separates society. Those who are not witches are treated differently, and by the time we find out why only certain people can use magic, it only reinforces the classism of the world. The show has answers for why those without magic are left to die of disease or hunger, it has a very good answer as to why witches have to remain relatively hidden. Not only that, but the show is constantly challenging the foundations of its world and whether it’s right or not. Every single character is, in some capacity, against the status quo and aims to change it.
Will this result in some kind of revolution? That remains to be seen. After all, the villains of the first season are very clearly those who are trying to tear down the foundations of magic society. But the fact that, throughout its first season, “Witch Hat Atelier” dares to constantly question whether its world is right or not makes all the difference. If you’re a fan of “Harry Potter” or fantasy in general, this is a must watch anime
