Heyo humans! It’s time for the 2026 edition of Anime Los Angeles down in Long Beach. We went down to see what this year has to offer and here are the details.
Right off the bat I will say that the convention keeps getting bigger with each passing year. Hotels become even more of a battle to get , as our room was quite a walk from the convention center (with more hotels being added to the block).
In the convention center, the dealers room gets bigger and more diverse. I noticed more big, elaborate booths compared to the previous years. Expanding from the usual merch like figures and shirts, to hair anime themed hair products and candles with characters on them.
Then there was the panels and the ever expanding topics they cover. You had the usual talk of anime shows (such as Uma Musume), and then a panel going over the history of horror films in Japan (done by the bold an daring folks over at A to J Connections), and even a stand up comedy tournament. Of course since I am involved in the show, a quick mention of the Cosplay Wrestling federation at this convention. This marks the 12th year at Anime Los Angeles, and shows no signs of slowing down.
For the guests of honor, this year features the debut of legendary coslayer Yaya Han as a guest. She hosted the masquerade, hosted a panel about navigating social media, and took time to have lengthy talks with fans at her signing booth. Yaya really imparted her years of much knowledge through out that weekend.
Now with guests, there was the very notable absence of the long time repeating apearance of content creator Kaho Shibuya (a topic that is hard to ignore). This all stems from accusations Kaho made about Anime Los Angeles not compensating her hotel cost back in 2024, taking several months to respond back to the complaint, and fumbling the compensation once they initiated it. Whatever the operations behind the scenes are for the convention, we can at least hope any circumstances that may have led to these accusations aren’t repeated with future guests.
Overall, the convention expands, and the most notable part of that is the variety of panels and the dealers hall. That’s where it shines for this year. I look forward to what next year holds and the many cosplayers that are always ever present. Until next time.
