Finding your nakama and slice-of-life arc with the UNSW Anime Society

The power of friendship and transformation sequences (of a kind)? It can only be AnimeUNSW.

Published on the 02 July 2026

UNSW Anime Society members posing with their Arc banner

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What exactly is the UNSW Anime Society?

Rooftop hangouts in between classes. A loveable bunch of students comprised of 'Brains', 'Beauty', 'Brawn' or 'Mascot' archetypes. Gathering outside a local store to buy snacks.

If you're expecting to live out a shonen-esque character arc while at university, then Anime UNSW is the place for you because there's a good chance you'll experience one or more of those aforementioned classic tropes in some shape or form.

Except for the rooftop hangouts. Those are restricted to the ground floor only at UNSW, unfortunately.

Established some 20 years ago (the history, as it is wont with many UNSW societies, is murky), Anime UNSW is a thriving community run on the power of friendship combined with a passion for all things anime and manga.

"We have over 500 paid members, but including non-paid members in our online space - that's our socials like Discord and Instagram - we have over 1000 members," says Aurelia Han, a third-year Commerce and Advanced Science student and President of Anime UNSW.

It's easy to assume that one must be a fan of anime to fit into this society, but the exec team stresses that there's absolutely no requirement to have any affinity for it.

"Anime is just a discussion topic, it's not always just about anime. It's also a bit about Japanese culture and online web novels. We're like an umbrella for a lot of that."

Aurelia Han
Anime UNSW President

"You don't need to be a super serious anime fan to be in our society because we run less anime-focused events as well," says Cathy Yu, a third-year Computer Science student and Anime UNSW's Marketing Executive.

Aurelia adds: "It's always community first. It's more about making friends [and] getting people to come together to talk about their interests. It's not never anime first, but it's more people-focused, so we're here for people to come together, hang out, make friends, socialise and also have fun while doing that."

Free weekly ramen, uni hangouts and online chats

With such a large member base, it's no surprise to find out that Anime UNSW is quite a busy society. There are plenty of opportunities to hang out with other members and yap about anime or whatever comes to mind.

"We have free weekly ramen for our paid members, we also have a chill lounge [which is] essentially a hangout session where you get to meet and socialise," explains Cathy. "Throughout the term, we have events like trivia and collabs with other societies. For example, we did a cosplay casino event with Tabletop Game Society and a base-building competition with Minecraft Society. We also have stalls at conventions, like HobbyCon and Smash."

That's just the tip of the (metaphorical) iceberg as Anime UNSW is always holding some kind of event for members to hang out together, ranging from board games, anime-themed challenges (like art competitions), cosplay competitions and casual off-campus outings. These events are typically well-attended, so socialising opportunities won't be in short supply.

"We actually don't have many anime watching events! It's a place for the community to come together to discuss anime that they've already watched or they're currently watching.

"You can always keep up to date on the latest news if you're talking to people in our servers or at our events."

Aurelia Han
Anime UNSW President

For those interested students who may feel nervous joining Anime UNSW, the society has worked hard to make it easy for newcomers to fit in. If in-person hangs are not preferable, there's a thriving online community.

"In the online space, it's pretty easy to talk to people. You introduce yourself, talk about your favourite anime, and anyone in similar degrees or interests can jump in and say hi," says Aurelia. "It's really easy to make friends in this space because the community is very welcoming and very friendly. All you need to do is say 'hi' and someone will already be there chatting."

With thousands of members on the group Discord server, there's almost always a space with like-minded people to chill with online. Combined with regular online events, the virtual space is as lively as in-person gatherings.

"We run weekly online events, like our online art events, and people just come together to play games on the server whenever," explains Aurelia. "Our online community is quite active, especially in recent months. Online spaces are always there, so people can engage through our events when they want."

Newcomers are often surprised at just how chill the society is when it comes to the anime of it all. Aurelia notes that members don't even have to watch anime to make friends.

"People are just so friendly and very down to have a chat about anything, really," she says.

The whole open-armed welcome from Anime UNSW to new members is not just a community vibe-building thing either. Cathy notes that while anime has been around for several decades, it has really become part of the mainstream in recent years, so people know more about it and are more keen to participate.

If there is one event that newcomers simply must go to, Cathy recommends the big kick-off welcome event for a big taster of what new members can expect from Anime UNSW.

"It's our biggest event, we run [games] like icebreakers, mingle bingo and a trivia competition," she explains. "We also have a cosplay competition and lots of great prizes to be won."

A gender-equalising society with wide-ranging anime tastes

It goes without saying that a society with a 20-plus-year history has gone through several iterations and guises. For Aurelia, she's made it a top priority to bring more women into Anime UNSW and have it feel more inclusive to everyone.

"When I first joined in my first year, there weren't many women, so there was a bit of hesitation to be heavily involved because I was a bit uncertain of what I was getting myself into," she recalls. "But the people and the rest of the team were great, so I was able to open up. Since then, I've made it a personal goal to increase the female member base and engagement."

"A lot of my close friends from uni are from the society. We worked together in the team last year and we just continued hanging out.

"Meeting people outside my degree and making close friends from this common interest, it's been really nice."

Cathy Yu
Anime UNSW Marketing Executive

The commitment to more female engagement has borne out across all levels in the society. Since Aurelia joined Anime UNSW, she says half of the exec team is now comprised of women. She's also noticed that there are more recurring female members at events compared to previous years.

"At the start of the year, a lot of women who do watch anime come to these events, but get intimidated when they see an overwhelming amount of guys," she says. "But with the change in team dynamic, I think that's had a positive influence on how our events are perceived."

That aforementioned team dynamic extends down to the smaller moments and gestures, which all add up to a bigger impact according to Aurelia: "I've put in a lot of personal effort to show up more in person at events, O-Week or online events, and through our marketing as well.

"If our marketing has more female representation and also caters anime towards a female demographic, that makes it a lot more welcoming for female members to join."

When asked about the most buzzed-about anime shows among the member base, Cathy and Aurelia take a moment to think. "That's tough!" they laugh.

"Jujutsu Kaisen and Chainsaw Man, because they're quite mainstream," ponders Aurelia. "[Most] people have watched anime to an extent, like something from Studio Ghibli to the [aforementioned] mainstream shows."

"Apothecary Diaries and Frieren as well!" adds Cathy. "A lot of people will watch action, so definitely that."

The next story arc for Anime UNSW

There's a storied history with Anime UNSW as one of the University's most popular societies, and the 2026 exec team is currently writing the latest chapter. Things are going really well, but the team is always looking forward in order to keep the society growing and relevant.

"My personal goal is to continue increasing the member base, especially with diverse members and international students, because international students make up a very large percentage of UNSW," says Aurelia.

Cathy adds: "I'm also aiming to increase the diversity of members within the society through the marketing, so we're making an effort to be more active on our WeChat and RedNote profiles."

As for any upcoming events to look forward to, members can also expect more fun collabs with other societies.

"We're looking into a collab with Lo-Fi Society and HoyoSoc. We did a scavenger hunt [in 2025] and we want to rerun that," says Aurelia. "We also have a collab in talks with the Rhythm Games Society, that would be an arcade crawl or karaoke. So yeah, plenty of collabs coming up!"

"We're aiming to market towards international students. We're doing that through our WeChat group and RedNote account

We have team members who can translate our posts into Chinese for international students, and we plan to expand to more platforms."

Cathy Yu
Anime UNSW Marketing Executive

What members say about Anime UNSW

To get a fuller picture of what the Anime UNSW experience is like, we also asked some members to share some quick thoughts with Student News.

Aria (1st year, Business): "I feel like people do not truly realise how fun this society can be due to all the negative stereotypes surrounding anime and fans of anime."
David Xu (3rd year, Economics/Computer Science): "Anime UNSW people are really social and outgoing! People you can easily have a beer with."

Rina (1st year, Actuarial Studies): "How much actually happens in the planning of an event, especially with collabs. There's a reason events meetings are notoriously long."
Felix Xia (1st year, Mechanical Engineering): "THERE'S CHINESE LANGUAGE SUPPORT IN THIS SOCIETY. NO ONE EVER ASKED FOR HELP. I'M TOTALLY JUST A SLAVE NOW!!!"
Eri (3rd year, Education (Secondary)/Fine Arts): "The sheer size of the society. It's not easy to tell at a glance who might be into anime while walking through campus, unless you sit down with someone and get to know them. However, with the society being one of the largest in UNSW, the big events we host can see a large turnout of people, meaning it's actually quite easy to find and make friends."
Aria: "Without being a part of Anime UNSW’s internal team, I feel like my uni experience would be very empty and just extremely sad 😭"
David Xu: "I've made so many new friends! After joining the internals team, it's really improved my public speaking and general confidence."
Eri: "I wouldn't know where I'd be without AnimeUNSW keeping me sane through exam periods. It's nice to always have something I can come back to and decompress to alleviate some of the built-up stress that accumulates throughout the term."
Aria: "I did not expect to gain a lot of confidence and become friends with a lot of people."
David Xu: "As aforementioned, I've met so many great friends here and I believe it's really helped my public speaking abilities!"
Rina: "Friends! I mostly expected to only be close to my fellow subcom, so becoming friends with the directors and execs was a nice surprise."
Eri: "I think I've grown a lot more confident, especially now that I've become an executive for this year."
Aria: "During mixology, I opened a Sprite bottle and it lowkey just blew up. There is also video footage of it T-T."
David Xu: "Tricking the internal team into thinking we got a speeding ticket during a road trip!"

Rina: "The near-constant clowning on of our events executive, David Xu. If there's an Anime UNSW inside joke, David's probably the butt of it. It's okay, David, we still love you, I think."
Eri: "[2026's] kick-off party definitely held a lot of surprises. Though I don't remember the details all too well, I remember some of the exec intros were really out there, and some of the performances really got the crowd excited, as well as bringing out some great laughs."
Aria: "Being a part of the internal team has definitely taught me how to manage my time between my studies, society responsibilities and hobbies."
David Xu: "Kinda? I really enjoy being in this society, but lowkey, I think I spend too much time doing stuff for this society (esp in T1). I should probs study more 😭"
Rina: "It definitely helps me in getting out of the house sometimes."
Felix Xia: "Yes, after I joined this society, I never attended a single lecture 😂"