Hell, while writing this very article I continuously watched random science stuff throughout! Don’t judge me – everyone does it. But procrastination isn’t necessarily laziness! You could procrastinate on writing a paper, but still do some work on other projects, I wouldn’t call you lazy! Yet we all know and love the relatable lazy balls of pure procrastination that can be found in most slice-of-life comedies, or even as the lazy-yet-powerful trope characters. Among colorful casts full of personality, it’s wondrous how distinguishable some of these uniformly “lazy” characters are. You’d expect a potato personality, yet some characters are amazing, and even unhindered by their laid back personalities. So to celebrate these sloths of anime, I’m ranking my picks for the most laid-back and chill characters in anime (ranked by popularity and by personal preference)!
12. Kiyotaka Ayanokōji
Anime: Classroom of the Elite So imagine a school for the most multi-talented geniuses and hard-working rich kids. A school where your lifestyle depends on how high up in the student ratings you are. Not a place where you’d imagine finding any lazy people, right? But our cunning hero got in anyway! Kiyotaka is lazy, laid-back, and unengaging. A boring person – at first glance that is. In reality, this MC is incredibly smart. And he’s at the bottom of the student rankings on purpose – he finished all tests with the EXACT score needed to barely pass! Although the listless MC is great, he can only fit as the last place on the list… since at the end of season 1 he starts trying harder, losing his “effortless” lazy side that we all want to love so much.
11. Ikta Solork
Anime: Nejimaki Seirei Senki: Tenkyou no Alderamin (Alderamin on the Sky) Now this one’s obvious! Like, he’s called the “The Invincible Lazy General” for a reason. He’s lazy, he hits on anyone older than him, and he’s righteous – quite the contradiction, lazy and brave! Plus he skips class, graduation, life, everything! Ikta hates handsome men, constantly threatening them, but will never miss a chance to flirt with an older woman – Kakyoin incarnate. His rank as a general is still well earned, though. He might be bad at sword fighting… and gunfighting… any type of combat, actually. So how did he become a general if he’s lazy, can’t fight, and skipped class? He’s a hyper-genius strategist, that’s how! I don’t get how he can be a strategist while skipping class, but good on him. This guy is blunt, pessimistic, and grim, even though he’s so lucky with everything in life. So I guess we can take this as an example that you don’t need to stay in school to achieve greatness. But come on kids, stay in school.
10. Shizuku Hazuki
Anime: New Game! Who doesn’t want to achieve their dream job? With a responsive team of like-minded people that can help even outside the work environment, that’s perfect! Most Japanese people will understand this dream, with the incredible cultural work ethic and mass overworking in office environments. That’s why the anime “New Game!” has such massive cultural appeal. It has everything: a pretty style, cute girls, and contrasting personalities that make the work environment colorful and lively. And while it is a “cute girls do cute things” anime, I think New Game! has a surprisingly OK plot in there. But enough on the show, onto the actual character. Shizuki is the head of the department where Aoba works. Yet she certainly doesn’t act like one. The office is closer to her home than a workspace. She sleeps on the job and has her cat roam the office. Sometimes she’s too lazy to even wear pants. Now that’s dedication.
9. Shikamaru Nara
Anime: Naruto Here we only consider the Naruto Shikamaru, as in Shippuden he becomes way more responsible and involved. And we don’t want that here. Also, while he does a lot of things, he’s still incredibly crazy. Shikamaru is another genius-level strategist (seeing a pattern here). He strategizes to expend the minimum level of effort possible, not to be efficient. Even his style of fighting is made for the sole purpose of not wasting energy! Shadows are efficient and don’t utilize any physical strength. He never seems to put in the effort to achieve anything, but that is in no way true! Shikamaru works as hard as anyone when it’s needed… Just never more than necessary. I wish I could have skipped school and still become a military-grade tactician!
8. Umaru-chan
Anime: Himouto! Umaru-chan Umaru is the embodiment of us all. She seems diligent and hardworking to the outside world, yet on the inside she’s a small little otaku ball that does nothing but watches anime, eats chips, and drinks coke. Also what’s interesting is why she’s able to make herself small. It’s stated by the author that Umaru-chan turning small is a superpower… yet she didn’t have a tragic backstory, so she used it to lazy about instead! Umaru is highly dependent on her brother, much to his dismay, so he forces her make friends. For which she uses the “hard-working school girl” personality to a hilarious extent.
7. Gintoki Sakata
Anime: Gintama You know someone is lazy when he’d rather wet the bed then get up at night. That’s our Gintoki, the man who had a 5-minute speech on why the truth of strawberry milk is the feeling of wetting the bed. Gintama is so lazy that he breaks the 4th wall just to skip a trope he finds bothersome! Gintoki could usually be found sitting on his sofa, picking his nose and lazing about – no job is too small for our Protag-Kun to procrastinate on. There was one time where Gintoki was about to enter a training arc… But he decided that it’s too much effort. Who needs a shounen training arc anyway? But then again, Gintoki has enough power anyways. The power of his wooden blade is truly astonishing, and he’d be a war machine… if he could be troubled enough to do so.
6. Shota Aizawa
Anime: Boku no Hero Academia (My Hero Academia) Aizawa is, theoretically, a great teacher. He sleeps in class, wears a sleeping bag, and probably can’t be bothered to give you a test. But Shota, while lazy, is an unforgiving teacher. He’ll threatening to expel students for the smallest mishaps. Unlike most people on this list, Aizawa is not too lazy – he does his job well, and he cares for his students and never skips out on heroism. Basically he’s the real-life type of lazy, where you can be lazy all you want in your off-time, but still put in the needed amount of effort when required! But god I wish I could sleep on my job without any consequences. Shota is known to expel students who he feels are not suited for U.A., but for some strange reason, he expelled no one in 1A. Maybe it’s because he’s too lazy, who knows.
5. Lucifer
Anime: The Devil is a Part-Timer! “Heaven can be found on Earth in a one-room second-floor apartment, you know? NEETs rule!” – Lucifer. This man (well, demon) is an ex-demonic general that lost after challenging the king of hell. The result? Death? Nope! He just got downgraded to a shut-in jobless NEET that wastes away playing games. Lucifer… isn’t against that, either. Lucifer was made to model a modern shut-in and is exaggerated beyond belief. The only way to motivate Lucifer is threatening to take away his consoles – nothing else, not even the wrath of Satan himself could make him move a muscle! That’s what I call lazy.
4. Shunsui Kyōraku
Anime: Bleach Shunsui would be an amazing dad. He has the dumb dad jokes, the dad bod, the flowery fashion scene. He’s a flirt to his assistant and very laid back with his job. Even in the “Infiltrating the Soul Society” arc when Kyoraku was supposed to capture Chad, he didn’t want to fight. He was too lazy for that. Shunsui is always laid back, taking joy in non-productive activities and skipping work with Rangiku, who also drinks instead of doing their job. But the funny thing is, this guy is a captain, so he’s quite powerful. Yet he consistently skips out on work, leaving everything to his talented assistant. I guess that’s really just smart thinking.
3. Gabriel Tenma White
Anime: Gabriel Dropout This character is quite a classic. Almost everyone knows about this anime, like Nichijou. The anime follows Gabriel: a top student of heaven that needs to do a sort of internship on earth by helping people. Well, Gabriel does that at the beginning, helping everyone in need. That… doesn’t last for long. Gabriel falls into multiple bad habits until she’s basically a 24/7 gamer who “helps” parties by being a healer. The funny bit about the show is the contrasting character to angelic Gabriel’s laziness: the beloved-by-everyone demonic Satania. While Gabriel is a top student of heaven that kind of fails, falling into being a full-on NEET… Satania is a student of hell who sought to bring chaos! But she just can’t not be helpful – the cute thing. So back on Gabriel, I will say that while her giving up being an angel just to have a lazy life may seem crazy, she’s still no contender for the rest of this list!
2. Kuro
Anime: Servamp Vampires are pretty much the symbol of laziness. Imagine sleeping for centuries and never leaving your house (er, coffin). You probably can’t get any lazier than that. Unless you’re out at night sucking blood like most vampires… Not Kuro though! He’s a lazy cat-vampire that never wanted to drink blood, or attack anyone. Or, well, move at all. He accidentally entered a contract that forced him to be active and stopped the lazy dream. Kuro never does anything – eating included – without being forced to. His hobbies include sleeping, resting, doing nothing, and murder! He’s also one of the oldest vampires, apparently. Come to think of it, I’d sleep all day too if I’ve lived through multiple millennia.
1. Tanaka
Anime: Tanaka-Kun is Always Listless I’ve waited for this comedic series forever! You could say Tanaka is my spirit animal. He takes laziness to the logical extreme – someone too lazy to move. Tanaka relies on his friend Oota for everything. Oota studies for him, carries him around everywhere, even cooks for him. Simply put: Tanaka is lazy. That’s the point, the name and the joke of the show. And it’s amazing! Anything that needs to be done, Tanaka does… not do. He almost died when Oota got sick, as he couldn’t do anything by himself. Now he can get soaked, or skip class, or fall out the window, just because he’s too lazy to prevent it. Easily one of the funniest anime series worth checking out if you haven’t already. Also for some reason, everyone keeps assuming that he’s not listless, but just that he’s a deep thinker… I strive to be as lazy as him every day.
