All kinds of anime have scenes set on the beach that people remember. These “one-episode wonders” are usually filler episodes that play with the characters in ways that have nothing to do with the story.
Almost always, they have some fan service and games that are played on the sand.
However, a lot of writers use beach scenes to combine the lightheartedness of the sun with the seriousness of their story. The performers still want to have fun, but they also want to remind people what the show is about or where it’s going.
Sometimes, anime beach episodes move the story forward, but most of the time, they are completely out of the blue.
The anime characters at the beach look like they’re having fun, but they’re not really doing anything that adds to the story or helps the characters grow.
Sometimes you have to wonder if the show was added for a reason other than to please fans.
Without further ado, here are the best anime beach scenes.
So, here are some Best Beach Episodes in Anime
15. Summer! Sea! Swimsuit Festival!! – Bleach
This is Episode 16 of Bleach Season 12. The show aired on July 14, 2009.
Soul Society women pick out their swimsuits at the beginning of the show.
The women and Ichigo are on vacation at the beach because Byakuya broke the pool for the women’s group.
Later, Ikkaku, Byakuya, Renji, Ukitake, and everyone else joined them.
It looks like everyone is having a good time until a hole that looks like a watermelon shows up and captures Inoue and two vice-captains.
14. Island Time: Assassination Classroom
Island Time is the seventeenth episode of the anime series Assassination Classroom. The show aired for the first time on May 15, 2015.
We show that it’s summer in this episode! Bug time! It’s time for sex mags!
Some students from Class E are out catching bugs to sell to make extra money for their trip to Okinawa.
Along the way, they run into Okajima, who has set up a trap for Korosensei. Will being sexy save the world?
13. Guilty Crown: Summer Day: Courtship Behavior
While Guilty Crown came out in 2011, 2039 seemed farther away. But now, this dark sci-fi is getting closer and closer to that year.
Shu Ouma, the main character, is a teenager who can take tools or guns from other people.
Ouma uses this to liberate Japan from GHQ, a UN-created organization that had Japan under its control after a virus spread.
Episode 8 of Guilty Crown jumps between a time for characters to enjoy the beach and a way to get to the end of the story.
Because Ouma is always thinking about a task, he ends up using someone he met in school for one.
Still, at the end of it all, the two characters share a real moment and become closer when they realize they feel the same way.
12. Song Of The Stars: Fairy Tail
After deciding to take part in the Grand Magic Games, the Tenrou Team spends this episode spread out in different places to train and keep up with the times.
The mages are slowly getting their magic power back as they train.
They hope that in three months they will be fully prepared for the Games.
But because Virgo showed up out of the blue, Team Natsu, Juvia, Levy, Wendy, and Carla need to go to the Celestial Spirit World right away because it’s an emergency.
11. Ouran High School Host Club: The Sun, The Sea, And The Host Club
Take a trip back in time to the original shoujo, where rich teenage boys give rich teenage girls what they want. Haruhi Fujioka, who is 15, is caught up in the racism, drama, and hosting.
Fujioka gets caught up in the plans of her private school’s host club because she looks like a boy and breaks an expensive vase. She is lucky that she fits right in and becomes close with each person as she learns more about them.
In Episode 8, the host club gets up to their usual shenanigans, but instead of picking shellfish and making women happy, they try to figure out what Haruhi is scared of. It’s important to note, though, that girls are being harassed during this task.
It takes a lot of guts for Haruhi to step up and protect them, but she risks her own safety in the process.
There is “fun in the sun” in this show, but there is also a lesson that some people will take advantage of others when they see a chance.
10. Yoko, Will You Do Me a Favor?—Gurren Lagann
The 12th episode of the Gurren Lagann anime is called “Yoko, Will You Do Me a Favor?” It played for the first time on June 17, 2007.
This episode shows the Dai-Gurren getting close to the water. Team Dai Gurren takes the time to relax and have fun while the mobile castle is being changed. Yoko, on the other hand, tries to beat Nia at beach games but fails.
Once the Dai-Gurren is ready to leave, the team sets sail, but Adiane’s sea monsters attack them.
The Gurren Lagann is too strong for Sayrune, so Adiane has to grab Nia.
But Yoko is able to shoot Sayrune through Nia’s hair, which lets Gurren Lagann destroy it. Nia is thankful and asks Yoko to cut her long hair afterward.
9. My Love Story!—My Ocean
From the start, My Love Story gets it right: clothes are for swimming! This cute Shoujo relationship story is about Takeo Gouda, who scares everyone around him, even the girls he likes.
When he saves Rinko Yamato, he starts to like her, but he doesn’t know if she likes him or his normally good-looking friend Makoto Sunakawa.
My Ocean is a typical beach story that has been changed to fit Gouda’s morals and values.
Even though he tells his classmates they shouldn’t fetishize girls in swimming suits, he feels sexually attracted to Yamato (and Yamato feels the same way about him).
Episode 11 is full of the ups and downs of a coming-of-age romance.
It ends with a sweet one-on-one moment between the two, who become more and more close every time they talk.
8. Hair Stand: Another
The eighth episode of Another is called “Hair Stand.” It aired for the first time on February 27, 2012.
In this episode, Kouichi and his friends get in Reiko’s car and drive to the vacation hotel where Matsunaga works to meet him.
Matsunaga is a former classmate of Reiko’s and holds the key to stopping the disaster.
While they wait for him to come, they spend the day at the beach and run into Mei, who is staying at her family’s summer home nearby.
They all enjoy not having to worry about being stuck in Yomiyama until… “I don’t want to ruin it.”
7. Food Wars!: Shokugeki No Sama—Final Exams
A cook-off on the beach is the best way to start a new season, right? This season continues the story of Sōma Yukihira, a boy who is sent to the prestigious Tōtsuki Culinary Academy.
It starts with new final tests. In just three days, school students have to set up food stands and make ¥3 million, which is about $22,701 USD.
Some outdoor games are played, but not many. There is still fan service and the thrill of competition.
Also, fans meet Suzuki, a new professor who seems a bit sketchy.
Food Wars makes its own beach episode, which keeps viewers guessing about what tasty food Yukihira and his friends will make next.
6. Drifters Of the Dead: High School of the Dead
The 16-minute OVA Drifters of the Dead is from the anime series High School of the Dead. It aired for the first time on April 26, 2011.
We see in this episode that Takashi Komuro and his friends get away from the zombie-infested shore and end up on a remote island near Tokonosu City.
As they look for goods on the island, they come across a small shack by the water that gives them clothes and a place to sleep for the night.
They spend all day gathering food, and then they start cooking what they’ve found.
A light cloud starts to form around them as they wait by the campfire, making them feel sick.
They try to get away from the strong smell, which turns out to be hydrangeas, a type of deadly plant that can make people have hallucinations.
5. Free! Iwatobi Swim Club: A Swim-Off in a Foreign Land!
In this story, Rin Matsuoka and Haruka Nanase, who used to be enemies but are now friends, talk about their memories of when Matsuoka first came to Australia.
In order to get Nanase excited about swimming again, he tells her a lot about his past.
The show began with friends getting back together to form a swim club.
As it goes on, everyone figures out what they’re going to do after high school.
In Season 2 Episode 12, they talk about not feeling like they fit (or not feeling like they do), being challenged by people who are better than them, depression, and the search for what swimming means to them.
4. What Happens Twice Can Happen Thrice—Gintama
What Happens Twice Can Happen Thrice is Episode 217 of the anime show Gintama. It aired for the first time on July 18, 2011.
What we see in this episode is that the Yorozuya help Hasegawa with his new job as a lifeguard in their free time.
To keep the kids from drowning, they scare them out of the pool.
Even though Hasegawa doesn’t like this plan, Gintoki has an easy answer: the public pool is a scary place, and they should learn this.
Gintoki and Hasegawa (reluctantly) start watching over the pool and looking at girls in their swimsuits because they can’t figure out what to do with Inception either.
3. Fruit Basket: Are You Really This Stupid?
In the Shoujo world, Fruits Basket is a common manga that has been turned into an anime. Tohru Honda, the main character, meets and finally moves in with a family.
She quickly discovers that if a person of the opposite sex hugs them, they can transform into an animal from the zodiac.
She learns about the pain and abuse that each member of the Soma family has been through over the years as she spends time with them.
Her patience and kindness are part of what fixes them, but she doesn’t know it.
Really, the beach episode of the show is more of a beach story because it goes on for a few more episodes.
The first part of the arc, Episode 6, gives a good idea of what’s to come.
There are lots of things to do, like swim races and gathering stag beetles, but Tohru is also learning a lot about herself and briefly dealing with a traumatic event in her family.
2. Remote Island Syndrome: The Melancholy Of Haruhi Suzumiya
The sixth episode of the first season of the anime show The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya is called “Remote Island Syndrome.”It played for the first time on May 7, 2006.
We see this in this episode The SOS Brigade and Kyon’s sister are welcome to stay at a “distant relative” of Itsuki’s brand-new island house.
When they get to the island for the first time, they enjoy its facilities, but a storm forces them inside.
Friends of Haruhi and hers play games inside and have fun while they wait for the storm to pass.
After some time, the villa’s owner goes missing, and everyone starts looking for him.
In the end, members of the SOS Brigade find him dead in his room.
1. My Hero Academia: Long Time No See, Selkie
Moving the focus while keeping inspiration high is something that My Hero Academia has always been good at.
At first, the show was about young Izuku Midoriya trying to find his place in the world of heroes.
Now, though, fans are more interested in his friends, who are also trying to find their place in the world of heroes in their own unique ways.
In the filler episode “Beach” of Season 5, Ochaco Uraraka, Tsuya Asui, Sirius, Nejire Hado, and Pro Hero Ryuko Tatsuma help Pro Hero Selkie stop stolen cargo at sea. This forms a side story.
This episode is a great mix of work and play, and it doesn’t really change the story of the show as a whole.
Still, the writers were able to put in some character growth for Uraraka that pushes her to get past the things that hold her back, like her lack of confidence and quirky traits.
People who watch Episode 16 are kept inspired and reminded to enjoy the good memories they have right now.
So, here we come to the end of this list.
Let me know in the comments which episode was your favorite on this list and if you liked our recommendations!
