According to recent estimates, HiAnime — the world’s biggest anime piracy site — has surpassed streaming service Disney+ in monthly global visits — even in Disney’s home of the United States.

Via Torrent Freak, website traffic tracker Similarweb data estimates that the anime piracy site HiAnime hit 364 million visits in October 2024, surpassing Disney’s total of 343 million in the same month. HiAnime’s total fell in November to 331.6 million but is still higher than that of Disney+ from the same period (328.2 million). Within Similarweb’s Streaming & Online TV category for the U.S., HiAnime ranked at #6 while Disney Plus ranked at #8. Furthermore, HiAnime’s total was nearly triple Crunchyroll’s traffic over the same period at 125.1 million. This is despite the platform being the world’s biggest anime-centric streaming service. It’s worth noting that Similarweb data points are estimations, relying on public sources like user tracking through extensions, free anti-virus software and data sold by ISPs.

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HiAnime Traffic Easily Surpasses Legal Anime Streaming Household Names Like Crunchyroll

HiAnime surpassing a massive household name like Disney+ is notable in its own right, but when considering its growth over the past few months, it becomes even more stark. HiAnime boasted an average of 209.5 million monthly visits from June to August; this jumped to 302 million in October. The shutdowns of major piracy websites during that period likely contributed to HiAnime’s rise, with Aniwave — boasting 170 million visits in August — disappearing overnight. Major piracy sites like Anitaku (GogoAnime) have recently stopped updating with no confirmed news about the site’s fate; this will likely increase HiAnime’s total more in the coming months. While it’s already on numerous watchlists, the implications of surpassing one of the biggest names in entertainment after already closing down previously make it even more impossible to ignore.

The data comes amid another recent report about anime streaming revenues for legal providers. Netflix ranked #1 with more estimated revenue than Crunchyroll and Hulu combined. While it shouldn’t be assumed that all, or even most, users of piracy sites will necessarily migrate to legal services, HiAnime’s massive user base indicates millions in lost revenue. Japanese anti-piracy coalition CODA’s stats suggest that the estimated cost of damage from pirated Japanese content was around 1.95-2.2 trillion yen (12.4-14 billion USD), nearly six times higher than in 2019.

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Legal streamers continue their attempts to limit piracy’s reach through court subpoenas, recently applied again to Anitaku and several other piracy sites worth hundreds of millions of visits, pressure through crime watchlists and DMCA takedown action. Google recently released a report into DMCA takedown request trends, revealing that anime licensees like Crunchyroll, Funimation and VIZ Media had authorized some of the highest takedown requests of any company to date.

Source: Similarweb via Torrent Freak