Manga is the Japanese word for comics and print cartoons. Outside of Japan, it usually refers specifically to Japanese comics. As of 2006, manga represents a five billion dollar global market. Manga developed from a mixture of ukiyo-e and foreign styles of drawing, and took its current form shortly after World War II. It comes mainly in black and white, except for the covers and sometimes the first few pages, and in some Animanga all the pages are colored. Popular manga are often adapted into anime, which is Japanese for animation, once a market interest has been established. Manga is sometimes mistakenly called anime even when not animated. Adapted stories are often modified to appeal to a more mainstream market. Although not as common, original anime is sometimes adapted into manga such as Neon Genesis Evangelion and Cowboy Bebop.

Manga as people know it in the 20th and 21st centuries only really came into being after Dr. Osamu Tezuka, widely acknowledged to be the father of story based manga, became popular. In 1945, Tezuka, who was studying medicine, saw a war propaganda animation film called Momotarou Uminokaihei whose style was largely influenced by Disney's Fantasia. As a children's film, the main theme of Fantasia was peace and hope in a time of darkness. Tezuka was greatly inspired by the film and later decided to become a comic artist, which at the time and even now was an unthinkable choice for a qualified medical doctor. He later commented that a part of reason he went to medical school was to avoid conscription and that he actually did not like seeing blood.

With an immense market in Japan, manga encompasses a very diverse range of subjects and themes, satisfying many readers of different interests. Popular manga aimed at mainstream readers frequently involves sci-fi, action, fantasy and comedy. Notable manga series are based on corporate businessman (the Shima Kousaku series), Chinese cuisine (Iron Wok Jan), criminal thriller (Monster) and military politics (The Silent Service).

When a series has been running for a while, the stories are usually collected together and printed in dedicated book sized volumes, called tankobon. These are the equivalent of American comic's trade paperbacks. These volumes use higher quality paper, and are useful to those who want to catch up with a series so they can follow it in the magazines or if they find the cost of the weeklies or monthlies to be prohibitive. Recently, deluxe versions have also been printed as readers have gotten older and the need for something special grew. Old manga have also been reprinted using somewhat lesser quality paper and sold for 100 yen (approximately one US Dollar) each to compete with the used book market.