Where to Read Manga on VIZ and MANGA Plus: What's Actually Free and What Costs Money

Chainsaw Man, Jujutsu Kaisen, One Piece, Death Note — a huge share of the manga people search for lives at VIZ Media, and VIZ splits access three ways: a handful of free chapters on viz.com itself, a $3.99-a-month Shonen Jump subscription that unlocks the whole simulpub library, and Shueisha's own MANGA Plus app, which is free with ads and covers a lot of the same ground. None of those is a downgrade from the others — they're different trade-offs, and which one is worth it depends on whether you want to catch up on one ongoing series or read everything Shonen Jump publishes.

Availability checked 19 September 2026. Platforms change catalogues, and access varies by country, device and subscription — always confirm on the official page before you commit to a series.

What you can read, and where

VIZ.com and the Shonen Jump subscription

VIZ's own site gives you the newest three chapters of most ongoing Shonen Jump series for free, no purchase needed. That's enough to sample a new series, but once a chapter ages out of that window it drops behind the Shonen Jump subscription — $3.99 a month as of the last price change, which unlocks the full digital vault (VIZ says 20,000-plus chapters) with day-and-date simulpub for the biggest titles. VIZ also dropped its old daily chapter-read cap, so once you're subscribed you can binge a whole backlog in a weekend instead of rationing it. New subscribers get a week free, which is enough to tell if the vault actually has what you want before you pay for it.

VIZ also runs a second, cheaper subscription called VIZ Manga ($1.99/month) for its non-Shonen-Jump catalogue — Shojo Beat, seinen, and other Shogakukan-licensed series that aren't part of Weekly Shonen Jump. It's easy to land on VIZ's site and not realize there are two separate subscriptions depending on which imprint a title comes from, so check which one a series actually needs before you sign up for the wrong one.

If you'd rather own something outright, VIZ also sells print and digital volumes directly and through Amazon — digital volumes have generally run around $6.99 each, though check the actual listing, since publishers move these prices more often than they update their own FAQ pages.

MANGA Plus by SHUEISHA — the free option

MANGA Plus is Shueisha's own app, not VIZ's, and it's genuinely free — supported by ads rather than a paywall. The free model mirrors VIZ's: the first three chapters and the latest three chapters of most ongoing series, at no cost. The real difference is that Shueisha's own digital-native "Shonen Jump+" originals run free from chapter one all the way through, with no vault to unlock. Since late 2025 that same simulpub deal has extended to Weekly Young Jump titles too, so the free catalogue keeps growing.

If ads bother you, or you want a series's full run without gaps, there's MANGA Plus MAX: $1.99 a month for ongoing series (access to a title lapses once it ends), or $4.99 a month for ad-free access that keeps completed series permanently. One quirk worth knowing: MANGA Plus isn't available in Japan, China, or South Korea — Shueisha built it for readers outside markets that already have their own official platforms, so if you're reading from one of those three countries this specific app isn't your route in.

Buying instead of subscribing

Not every series here is worth a subscription just to finish it. Completed titles like Pluto and Vagabond sit on VIZ as paid-only, print-and-digital, with no free chapters or simulpub option — you're buying the volumes outright, same as you would in a bookstore. For a series you already know you love and want to own, that's usually the better deal versus paying month to month for a vault you'll only dip into for one story.

Worth starting with

• Chainsaw Man — Free right now on both MANGA Plus and VIZ's latest-chapters window — the easiest way to test whether the simulpub habit is worth paying for.
• Kagurabachi — One of the biggest new simulpub hits of the last few years; free to keep up with weekly on MANGA Plus.
• Spy x Family — Ongoing and free-to-latest on both apps, with the full run behind the vault once you're caught up.
• Jujutsu Kaisen — Recently completed, so its full run now sits behind the Shonen Jump vault or MANGA Plus MAX rather than free simulpub.
• One Piece — The catalogue's biggest test case: reading it all for free would take forever waiting for chapters to age off the free window, so most people subscribe or buy the early volumes outright.
• Death Note — Short and complete, which makes it one of the better $3.99-a-month vault reads if you only want the subscription for a single binge.
• Vagabond — Paid-only here — no subscription shortcut, just print or digital volumes, which is honestly the right way to own this one anyway.
• Pluto — Same deal as Vagabond: buy it, don't wait for it to show up free somewhere.