Movie

Top 10 Best Animated Movies

Animation is not a genre but a medium, and these films prove it can achieve emotional and artistic heights that rival any live-action masterpiece. From hand-drawn wonder to digital innovation, these are the pinnacle of the craft.

2026126 viewsMar 12, 2026 Updated Oct 3, 2026

Top10Grid rankings are decided by votes, not algorithms — use the buttons below to move this list.

Media

Community rankings for this Film

Be the first

Top10Grid Editorial

Editorial team

Current Rankings

0
#1
Spirited Away (2001)
Spirited Away remains the highest-grossing film in Japanese box office history, earning over $395 million globally, and was the first anime to win the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature. Hayao Miyazaki's magnum opus follows a girl trapped in a spirit world bathhouse, weaving a coming-of-age tale that blends Japanese folklore with universal themes. With 97% of scenes hand-drawn, the meticulous artistry outweighs the average animated film's digital approach, creating an immersive fantasy that captivates audiences more than two decades later.
Watch →
Details →
0
#2
The Lion King (1994)
The Lion King's Shakespearean narrative on the African savanna delivers powerful emotional storytelling that has made it a cultural phenomenon, grossing over $1.6 billion across all releases. Hans Zimmer's score and Elton John's songs, including the Oscar-winning "Can You Feel the Love Tonight," elevate this epic above the typical Disney Renaissance film, with 4 Oscar wins and a 93% Rotten Tomatoes score. While not as daring in visual experimentation as #3, Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse, its hand-drawn animation and mature themes of responsibility and loss have sold more than 55 million home video units, making it the best-selling animated title on home video.
Watch →
Details →
0
#3
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse (2018)
Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse reinvented animation with a groundbreaking comic book visual style that feels genuinely revolutionary, winning the Academy Award for Best Animated Feature and earning $384 million worldwide on a $90 million budget. By using 24 frames per second on twos, it mirrors the speed of comic books, reducing production costs by 30% compared to the average CGI film while delivering 177 unique characters.
Watch →
Details →
0
#4
WALL-E (2008)
WALL-E's near-silent first act depicting a lonely robot on a deserted Earth is among the most daring sequences in family filmmaking, earning a rare 95% Rotten Tomatoes score and grossing over $533 million globally. Its environmental message and tender love story resonate across all age groups, with a budget of $180 million yielding a 3x ROI that outperforms, Spirited Away, in commercial profitability relative to cost. The film uses only 40 minutes of dialogue across its 98-minute runtime, making it 60% more dialogue-free than the average animated feature, a bold choice that underscores its emotional restraint and universal appeal beyond language barriers.
Watch →
Details →
0
#5
Princess Mononoke (1997)
Princess Mononoke (1997) delivers the most morally complex animation ever crafted, featuring 1,440 hand-drawn cels and a layered environmental narrative. Studio Ghibli spent 15% of the budget on live-action animal studies, lending nature a gritty realism that surpasses the typical fantasy film's anthropomorphism.
Watch →
Details →
0
#6
Toy Story (1995)
Toy Story (1995) pioneered fully computer-animated filmmaking with 400,000 frames of digital rendering, launching a cinematic revolution that remains 30% cheaper per minute than traditional cel animation. The film's revolutionary RenderMan software, still used today, gave Woody's pull-string a tactile realism that beat the average animated character's stiffness. Randy Newman's score and Tom Hanks' voice anchored a narrative where toys' fear of obsolescence mirrored human anxieties, a nuanced theme that predates Ratatouille's artistic critique by 12 years.
Watch →
Details →
0
#7
Grave of the Fireflies (1988)
Grave of the Fireflies (1988) remains one of the most devastating war films ever made, using 1,400 hand-drawn frames to follow siblings Seita and Setsuko's struggle in WWII Japan. The film's unflinching depiction of starvation uses a 0.5% sugar cube ration as a recurring motif, a concrete cruelty that outperforms the typical war movie's battle scenes.
Watch →
Details →
0
#8
Ratatouille (2007)
Ratatouille (2007) is Pixar's most thematically rich work, with Anton Ego's climactic speech defending artistic criticism earning a 96% Rotten Tomatoes rating—4 points higher than the average animated film's metacritic score. Its 110-minute runtime uses 1,800 storyboard revisions to balance a rat-chef premise with profound insights, outperforming Grave of the Fireflies' single-tone tragedy in narrative versatility. The film's food animation required 15% more rendering hours than typical CGI dishes, making Remy's ratatouille appear as a sensory masterpiece that rivals any live-action food scene. Brad Bird's script weaves a defense of creativity that surpasses Toy Story's innovation theme, proving art's value regardless of origin—a claim backed by $623 million global box office.
Watch →
Details →
0
#9
Akira (1988)
Akira (1988) remains the definitive masterpiece of hand-drawn sci-fi, boasting 160,000 individually painted cels that still dwarf most modern digital productions. Katsuhiro Otomo's cyberpunk epic set in a post-apocalyptic Neo-Tokyo was a watershed moment for anime in the West, and its fluid animation and dystopian vision influenced everything from The Matrix to Stranger Things.
Watch →
Details →
0
#10
The Incredibles (2004)
The Incredibles (2004) is the greatest superhero family drama ever made, earning $631 million worldwide on a $92 million budget—a 6.8x return that outperforms many of its live-action rivals. Brad Bird spun a tale of mediocrity, exceptionalism, and midlife crisis that gives it surprising depth for a family film, while Pixar’s animation delivers elastic fight choreography that rivals Akira’s kinetic battles.
Watch →
Details →

Current Rankings

Share this list

126 views

Get ranking updates

Get the weekly film rundown

Only lists published since the last email. Join the early readers.

Only Top 10s published in the last 7 days
One email a week — and none at all in a week with nothing new
Unsubscribe in one click

No spam. One email per week. Unsubscribe anytime.

Readers Also Ranked

More Lists Like This

Netflix Top 10 Movies — Global — Aug 24, 2026

#1Spider-Man: Brand New Day
#2The Odyssey
#3Mutiny

Top 10 Trending Movies This Week

#1Mutiny
#2Toy Story 5
#3Spider-Man: Brand New Day

Top 10 Trending Movies This Week

#1Spider-Man: Brand New Day
#2The Odyssey
#3Minions & Monsters

Top 10 Most Debated: Marvel vs DC

#1The Dark Knight vs. Avengers: Endgame
#2Heath Ledger's Joker vs. Thanos
#3Batman vs. Iron Man

Frequently asked questions

What is the #1 animated movie on the list?

The top spot often goes to classics like 'Spirited Away' or 'Toy Story', but the exact ranking depends on the criteria used—check the list for the specific #1 entry.

Are all these movies from Disney or Pixar?

No, the list includes films from various studios such as Studio Ghibli, DreamWorks, and others, not just Disney or Pixar.

How recent are the movies in the Top 10?

The list typically spans several decades, from early animated classics like 'Snow White' (1937) to modern hits like 'Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Verse' (2018).

What criteria were used to select the best animated movies?

Common criteria include critical acclaim, cultural impact, animation quality, storytelling, and audience ratings from sources like IMDb or Rotten Tomatoes.