From ‘Zootopia 2’ To ‘The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants’, Here Are The 10 Best Animated Films Of 2025 Ranked
As major studios cut budgets, live-action films witnessed a record slump in 2025, allowing animated films to rule the theaters. From Zootopia 2 to Ne Zha 2, multiple animated films crossed the $1 billion mark in record numbers this year, dispelling traditional beliefs that anime is for kids.
Animated films allow directors to skip hoops that live-action films can’t, bringing stories to life in a colorful and complete manner. Their cost of production is also relatively lower than their live-action counterparts, which explains the uptake in the genre by major studios.
As the year of the anime revolution, 2025 had an array of exceptionally good animated films, so here are ten standout performers ranked.
‘Zootopia 2’
Zootopia 2 was Disney’s surprise package of 2025’s Thanksgiving weekend, exceeding expectations to gross $158.8 million domestically and $560.4 million worldwide in its opening weekend. The film continued to break records, crossing the $1 billion mark in just 17 days, cementing the top spot for the PG IP in global cinema.
Central to the film’s success is the prized partnership between Judy (Ginnifer Goodwin) and Nick (Jason Bateman), which has now reached legendary status. Zootopia 2 picks up right after its predecessor, following the crime-fighting duo as they chase down Zootopia’s newest villain, Gary De’ Snake (Ke Huy Quan).
Featuring a deeper storyline that explores the very origins of Zootopia, with a touch of political drama, the film’s gripping plot achieved worldwide popularity in record time, putting it on track to become one of the highest-grossing films of all time.
‘Elio’
Pixar has a long track record of successful original IPs, which is why Elio’s abysmal theatrical run came as a surprise. The film follows Elio, an overly enthusiastic but lonely boy with an alien obsession, who gets himself abducted by an interstellar peace organization that mistakes him for the leader of Earth.
It only grossed $154M globally against its reported budget of up to $200M, making it one of Disney’s biggest flops of 2025. However, the film found its deserved success on streaming platforms, becoming Disney’s number one in more than 59 markets for weeks upon its digital release.
Elio doesn’t just boast of a grounded original story; its blend of action and comedy is on the next level.
‘Dog Man’
Dreamworks built on the success of Captain Underpants with this hit, whose success has catapulted the franchise to blockbuster status. Dog Man grossed $145.6M against a $40M budget, beating the franchise’s flagship film by over $20M.
It is set in the Captain Underpants universe, and follows the crime-fighting adventures of super cop Dog Man, who was created after doctors were forced to sew the head of a golden retriever named Greg onto the body of his owner (Officer Knight) to save his life after a car accident.
Besides a perfectly-timed release window, the film benefited heavily from word of mouth as it became the year’s fan-favorite kids’ film.
‘The Bad Guys 2’
Banking on the success of the first films, Dreamworks released this hit, which was further boosted by the voice performance energy of the returning cast, led by Sam Rockwell as the vibrant Mr. Wolf.
The Bad Guys 2 follows the titular gang of anthropomorphic animals who get entangled in a plot to pull off the largest heist in history despite trying their best to reform and be accepted back into society.
The sequel doesn’t abandon the punchy visual gags and high-octane action that made the first film great, although its storyline is original enough to accommodate newcomers, hence its box office success.
‘Ne Zha 2’
The film follows Chinese mythological character Ne Zha and his friend Ao Bing, who after their rebirth, join a high-stakes battle to stop the corrupt Master Xian Wuliang from destroying their homeland of Chentang.
The film picks up immediately after the first film with a similarly high-stakes story and punchy visuals that made it an immediate theatrical success.
Ne Zha 2 is the Chinese domestic behemoth that rewrote the global box office in 2025 to become the highest-grossing film of the year, at a whopping $1.9B worldwide. Being the highest-grossing animated film of all time, Ne Zha 2 has become the pride of the Chinese film industry as well as the animation genre.
‘KPop Demon Hunters’
Despite its limited theatrical run, Maggie Kang’s KPop Demon Hunters was a surprise success, especially on Netflix, where it garnered a blinding 325M viewers, beating Squid Game to become the most-watched title in the streamer’s history, according to Variety.
The musical follows a K-Pop trio called the Huntrix, led by Rumi (voiced by Arden Cho), whose shining music career also doubles up as a cover for their demon-hunting mission that stops the evil leader of the Demon World, Gwi-Ma, from consuming human souls.
Its deep storyline is the perfect marriage between Korean mythology and urban legend, which proved extremely popular, leading to Netflix ordering a sequel almost immediately.
‘Little Amélie or the Character of Rain’
Little Amélie or the Character of Rain is the hidden gem of the year that has proved extremely popular for perfectly capturing the innocence of childhood in a colorful, magical world. Despite its simplicity, the film portrays a touching, multilayered story of healing from loss and generational trauma from a child’s perspective.
It is a quietly moving animated picture, rooted in European and Japanese culture, that evokes the clearest contrast of emotions, leaving viewers happy and sad in equal measure. At the center of the film is little Amelie, a gifted child whose memories unlock a series of miracles that change everyone she comes into contact with.
It didn’t make the most headlines upon release at the Cannes Film Festival, but its 98 percent Rotten Tomatoes score is a near-perfect reflection of the wealth of creativity that it carries.
‘Predator: Killer of Killers’
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Predator: Killer of Killers was director Dan Trachtenberg’s surprise gift to fans before the release of Predator: Badlands.
The film is presented as a four-part anthology series that follows the battles and the subsequent kidnapping of three heroes from different time periods who have defeated their respective Predators. It then culminates in the ultimate battle when all three must take on the Predator warlord in gladiatorial combat.
The film captures the true spirit of the Predator franchise, presented in just the right amount of action and gore but not deviating from the main theme. Unfortunately, while Killer of Killers is undoubtedly the better film, it was Predator: Batlands that got the theatrical release, so the former didn’t get as much mainstream attention.
‘The King of Kings’
Seong-ho Jang’s The King of Kings is a uniquely told story of Jesus, capturing the innocence of a young boy as he is turned into a character in the biblical tale. The film is presented as the story of Jesus being told by Charles Dickens (Kenneth Branagh) to his son Walter (Roman Griffin Davis).
The blurring of timelines turns the narrative into a lively tale of the story of Jesus from a whole new angle. Grossing $77.5M worldwide, the film, which was perfectly timed with its Easter release, was a surprise success. Its colorful animation with slow pacing turned it into a universally acceptable PG slow burn for families.
‘The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants’
Paramount decided to reignite the joy of SpongeBob fans with this holiday release, uniquely designed to onboard a new generation of kids with an extended touch of humor for adults as well.
SpongeBob remains a cultural sensation, so bringing back the character after a decade of waiting was always bound to impress, but the film’s animation, pacing, and punchy one-liners were amazingly replicated.
The SpongeBob Movie: Search for SquarePants features a new adventure for SpongeBob SquarePants who has to save himself and a bunch of newfound friends from an evil ghost pirate after joining a wild ride to the underworld in a doomed bid to prove himself as a “big boy.”
Taking a horror theme, this film added a new level of depth to the franchise without alienating its older generation of fans.
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