Hajime No Ippo is a Japanese manga series and anime considered by many as one of the greatest of all time. It’s a boxing-themed show written and illustrated by George Morikawa. It has been serialized since 1989, and its anime adaptation ran from 2003 to 2014. It suddenly stopped, but recent rumors speculate it’s coming back for a fourth season.
Season 4 Update
As of late 2025, there’s no official announcement or release date for a fourth season of Hajime no Ippo from Kodansha, the production committee, Madhouse or Netflix. No verified press release or industry source has confirmed production plans.
Despite strong fan interest and speculation on social media, the anime’s production team has not released any statement about continuing the series. A post on X claims an announcement is coming in December 2025, but this hasn’t been verified by any official source and should be treated as false information.
The original anime ended with the third season Rising in 2014, and while the manga continues with plenty of material that could be adapted, there’s no confirmed production plan yet.
If an official Season 4 announcement happened, a rough timeline might look like:
- Pre-production & planning: 3–6 months
- Animation & recording: 6–18 months (depending on episode count and studio resources)
- Total until broadcast: 1 to 2 years
Plot
Ippo Makunouchi was a quiet high schooler who couldn’t make friends since he was usually helping his mom manage their family fishing charter business. Because of this, he is often a target for bullies.
When he was being beaten up by goons, a passing middleweight professional boxer intervened and took the wounded Ippo to the Kamogawa Gym for treatment. They attempted to cheer him up by allowing him to express his anger on a sandbag.
That’s how they saw the young man’s potential in boxing. Following that incident, Ippo gave the predicament a lot of thought and decided that he wanted to pursue a professional boxing career.
Manga
Since October 11, 1989, the manga has been serialized in Kodansha’s Weekly Shonen Magazine. It has been printed in the publication for almost 30 years, with the 1000th chapter published in December 2012.
In 2021, it was the eighth longest-running manga series in Japan, with over 1300 chapters produced. Kodansha has divided the chapters into separate tankobon volumes.
For the first time in its 33 years of activity, it was officially confirmed in 2021 that the series would be released digitally, beginning July 1 of that year. This is also what sparked the speculations for the anime’s season four.
Anime
Hajime no Ippo is a 76-episode (including DVD special) anime TV series directed by Satoshi Nishimura and presented by Madhouse, Nippon Television, and VAP. It aired on Nippon TV on October 4, 2000.
Kohei Kiyasu voices the protagonist Ippo Makunouchi in Japanese. Other major cast members include Rikiya Koyama (Mamoru Takamura), Kenji Utsumi, Keiji Fujiwara, and Wataru Takagi. In North America, Geneon Entertainment licensed the first series in 2003 and issued it under the title Fighting Spirit.
The first season aired from October 4, 2000, to March 27, 2002. It came back with a season two on January 6, 2009, until June 30 of the same year. Season 3 was from October 5, 2013, up to March 29, 2014.
The anime also includes a TV film (Champion Road) and an OVA (Mashiba vs. Kimura) released in 2003 between the first and second seasons.
