Anime & Manga Events

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Anime California 2026

Aug 1 – Aug 2, 2026 Cancelled Long Beach Convention Center, 300 …

Anime California at the Long Beach Convention Center is the SoCal alternative for the anime fan who finds AX overwhelming — same categories (cosplay, panels, artist alley, gaming, Japanese culture) at a scale where you can actually see everything. August 1-2. An hour from San Diego, right on the Long Beach waterfront. Tickets from $35 at animecalifornia.com. The cosplay contest Saturday night is legitimately competitive.

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Collect-A-Con Los Angeles 2026

Aug 1 – Aug 2, 2026 Los Angeles Convention Center, 120…

Collect-A-Con Los Angeles 2026 brings the nation's largest trading card, anime, and pop culture convention back to the Los Angeles Convention Center on August 1-2, 2026. With over 900 dealer tables spread across West Hall A, this is the ultimate destination for collectors of Pokemon, Magic: The Gathering, One Piece, and sports cards, alongside anime merchandise, Funko POPs, vintage toys, comics, and rare video games. Whether you are hunting for a holographic Charizard, completing your set of One Piece cards, or browsing through walls of nostalgia, Collect-A-Con creates the kind of floor experience that turns casual fans into lifelong collectors. The event features live box break events, trading sessions, celebrity guest appearances, and exclusive convention-only merchandise drops. The Los Angeles Convention Center West Hall A offers easy parking access and is centrally located for collectors from across Southern California. LA, Orange County, the Inland Empire, and San Diego all have strong collector communities that converge here every year. Two-day passes are available on Ticketmaster. Doors open 10am both days. Come ready to trade, hunt, and discover. Admission: General admission and two-day passes available via Ticketmaster. VIP early entry options available.

Dragonfest Expo 20th Anniversary — Asian Martial Arts & Culture Glendale

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30 days away

Dragonfest Expo 20th Anniversary — Asian Martial Arts & Culture Glendale

Aug 1, 2026 TBA — check Eventbrite Glendale Civic Auditorium, 1401 N …

Twenty years. The Martial Arts History Museum's flagship celebration returns on August 1, 2026 at the Glendale Civic Auditorium for its biggest milestone yet: the 20th Annual Dragonfest Expo. This is the event that calls itself the greatest cultural and martial arts expo in the world, and the twenty-year anniversary brings the full scale of that claim to Glendale. Attendees get access to legendary martial arts celebrities and icons — meet-and-greets, Q&A sessions, and photo opportunities with the people who defined martial arts on film and in competition. Six-part Q&A lecture series with guest speakers. Spectacular Asian cultural performances. A full cosplay photo experience for the anime and gaming crowd that has always overlapped with martial arts fandom. The audience for Dragonfest is wider than any single fandom. If you grew up on kung fu films, anime with fight choreography, video game tournaments, or any corner of Asian pop culture, this event hits something fundamental. The Martial Arts History Museum — a nonprofit institution dedicated to preserving martial arts history and culture — runs this as its annual showcase. All proceeds fund the museum directly. All ages welcome. Six hours of programming from 11 AM to 5 PM. Paid parking available at the Glendale Civic Auditorium. The auditorium is accessible by Metro and public transit from across Los Angeles County. This is the 20th anniversary. If you've been to Dragonfest before, this is the year you don't skip. If you haven't been, this is the year to start. August 1, 2026 — Glendale Civic Auditorium.

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30 days away

SheroCon 2026 — Van Nuys, CA

Aug 1, 2026 7900 Balboa Blvd Ste B, Van Nuys, …

There are rooms in the comics and gaming world where the art on the walls and the people running the tables look different from every other convention. SheroCon exists because someone decided to build one. Organized by Shero Comics, SheroCon is a half-day convention celebrating women, non-binary, and femme-presenting creators across comics, anime, gaming, and creative tech. Not a panel about inclusion. Not a track added to a larger convention. A room that is entirely theirs — with artists, cosplayers, tabletop players, and workshops oriented around the communities that are underrepresented at every other show. The venue is part of the experience: Valley Relics Museum in Van Nuys houses decades of Southern California neon, vintage signage, and pop culture ephemera. The backdrop alone makes SheroCon unlike anything you have seen at a hotel ballroom convention. Whether you are a creator looking for your people, a cosplayer looking for a stage, or someone who has walked into convention dealer halls and felt like a tourist — this is the room that was built for you. Saturday, August 1, 2026 · 12PM–6PM · Valley Relics Museum, Van Nuys · All ages · Free entry (premium tiers available)

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22 Gathering

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Anime SD: Summer Cosplay Social

Aug 1, 2026 Free Balboa Park, San Diego, CA 92101

Balboa Park, August 1st, 2026. Free. The Summer Cosplay Social is the gathering that doesn't require tickets or a schedule or a badge — just a character and the willingness to show up in the park where the architecture gives every costume the backdrop it deserves. Balboa Park in August does something that makes outdoor cosplay photography look like production work without any production. The Spanish Colonial Revival buildings, the fountain plazas, the museum facades — these settings read as fantasy environments regardless of what you're cosplaying. An armor build catches the afternoon light against the Botanical Building in a way that photographers plan shoots around. A soft character design photographs against the garden in ways that require no post-processing. The social runs as an open community gathering — no formal schedule, no judging, no hierarchy between the group who spent six months on a build and the group in store-bought costumes who showed up because it looked like fun. Both are welcome. Photographers with real cameras show up alongside phone cameras. The park provides the setting; the people provide the energy. Follow Anime SD on Meetup for the exact gather location. meetup.com/anime-watch-san-diego. August 1st. Free. Show up in costume and find your people.

Orange County Water Lantern Festival 2026

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90 Gathering

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Orange County Water Lantern Festival 2026

Aug 1 – Aug 2, 2026 From 0.99 Centennial Park, 3000 W Edinger Av…

As the sun sets over Centennial Park in Santa Ana, thousands of paper lanterns hit the water — and for one hour, Orange County becomes something else entirely. The Orange County Water Lantern Festival returns August 1–2, 2026, with two evenings of music, food trucks, and the kind of communal ritual that people travel hours to be part of. Lanterns open at 5:00 PM each day, with the main lantern launch happening between 8:00 and 9:00 PM as darkness falls over the park pond. Every attendee receives a lantern kit at check-in: you'll decorate your lantern with the included markers — write a wish, a name, a message — then set it gently on the water with hundreds of strangers doing the same thing at the same time. The effect is genuinely arresting: a slow-moving carpet of warm light spreading across the dark water while live acoustic music plays from the stage nearby. The event takes place at Centennial Park's pond area, well-served by OC bus routes and with free parking available in the adjacent lot. Food trucks are on-site serving dinner, and lawn seating is BYO-blanket. Tickets start at 0.99 early bird (rising to 7.99 at the gate) and include the lantern kit — children 3 and under are free. This is not a passive spectacle: you are part of what you're watching. That's the mechanic that makes it stick. Purchase through the Water Lantern Festival's official site.

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Tiki Oasis 2026 — San Diego

Aug 5 – Aug 9, 2026 Weekend pass $100-200 · Night tickets $35-65 500 Hotel Circle North, San Diego,…

Tiki Oasis is the world's largest tiki culture convention and one of the most unusual community gatherings in San Diego. Since 2001, the event has brought together collectors, artists, musicians, bartenders, fashion enthusiasts, and die-hard aficionados of mid-century Polynesian pop culture for a five-day immersive celebration at the Town and Country Resort in Mission Valley. Each year centers on a theme that shapes the art, entertainment, vendor selection, and fashion. Attendees dress in full tiki regalia — vintage Hawaiian shirts, muumuus, leis, and elaborate cosplay. The convention features live exotica and tiki-adjacent musical performances, rum and cocktail seminars led by some of the country's top bartenders, an extensive vendor marketplace with handmade ceramics and collectibles, and art exhibitions from the world's best tiki artists. The tiki community is one of the most coherent subcultures in American pop culture — defined by a shared aesthetic vocabulary, a love of craftsmanship, and a genuine reverence for the mid-century obsession with tropical fantasy. If you've ever felt the pull of a mug shaped like a skull and a rum drink named after a deity, this is your people. Tiki Oasis 2026 runs August 5–9 at Town and Country Resort, 500 Hotel Circle North, San Diego. Passes available at tikioasis.com. Individual night tickets and full weekend passes available. The pool parties and live band performances are the highest-demand events — book early.

Sturgis Motorcycle Rally 2026 — Sturgis, SD

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🌎 Nation's Best 36 days away

Sturgis Motorcycle Rally 2026 — Sturgis, SD

Aug 7 – Aug 16, 2026 Main Street, Sturgis, SD 57785

Ten days in August, and the small town of Sturgis, South Dakota — population 7,000 — becomes a city of half a million. The Sturgis Motorcycle Rally has been doing this since 1938. Arrive in Sturgis on the first Friday of the rally and the sound alone tells you something is different. Main Street closes to cars and opens to motorcycles, and the flow of custom Harleys, touring bikes, and custom builds becomes a continuous parade. The surrounding Black Hills are the real draw for serious riders: Needles Highway is 14 miles of narrow tunnels and granite spire switchbacks that belong on every motorcyclist's bucket list. Iron Mountain Road corkscrews through South Dakota's most dramatic terrain. The rally itself spawns music stages, vendor villages, stunt shows, bike shows, and pop-up bars across a 50-mile radius — the Buffalo Chip alone hosts major touring acts nightly. The diversity of the crowd surprises first-timers: veterans and newcomers, engineers and mechanics, people who rode three states to get here and people who flew in and rented a bike. The common denominator is the machine. Sturgis is for anyone who rides or wants to understand what riding means to the people who live it. This is not for people looking for a sanitized festival experience with VIP sections and scheduled activities. It is for those who find meaning in the open road, want to ride some of the most spectacular terrain in the country, and are comfortable with ten days of organized chaos. If you are a motorcyclist who has never been, Sturgis before you die is not a cliche — it is a genuine recommendation. Book accommodations now. Not soon. Now. Hotels and campgrounds within 50 miles of Sturgis sell out months in advance, and the closer to Main Street, the earlier they go. The Buffalo Chip is the largest campground and hosts the best concerts — book a camping package directly with them. Bring rain gear: August in South Dakota includes afternoon thunderstorms that clear fast. Gas up before you reach Main Street — the lines at pumps on rally days are long. Parking on Main Street is motorcycle only, which means you park your bike among 50,000 others and walk the strip. That is the point. Sturgis earns its place on Falkor Nation's Best list because it is not trying to be anything other than what it has always been: a gathering of people who chose a lifestyle, not just a hobby. There is no corporate polish here, no influencer activations, no sponsored experiences. There is Needles Highway at sunrise, a custom build that took three years, and 450,000 people who made the same choice to show up. That kind of authenticity is increasingly rare. Sturgis 2026 runs August 7-16 in Sturgis, South Dakota. Event information at sturgis.com.

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18 Gathering

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Midsummer Scream 2026: Horror Musicals

Aug 7 – Aug 9, 2026 35.0 Long Beach Convention Center, 300 …

Midsummer Scream, the West Coast's largest Halloween and horror convention, returns to the Long Beach Convention Center August 7-9, 2026, with the theme 'Horror Musicals.' Now in its tenth year, the event has grown into a three-day destination for haunted attraction designers, horror film fans, cosplayers, collectors, and anyone who lives for the season year-round. The Hall of Shadows, the convention's signature attraction, runs all three days across a massive darkened section of the convention center. More than a dozen fully produced haunted experiences and haunt displays are open inside, included with all badge types, no separate ticket required. It is the largest indoor haunt zone in California outside of the October season itself. The show floor features more than 350 vendors and artists offering horror-themed costumes, seasonal decor, original artwork, vintage collectibles, props, and franchise merchandise. Celebrity guests for 2026 include Matthew Lillard, Barry Bostwick, and Jasmin Savoy Brown. A special 20th anniversary celebration of Repo! The Genetic Opera is scheduled with director Darren Lynn Bousman and actor Bill Moseley confirmed. Panel programming covers haunt design, genre cinema, practical effects, cosplay construction, and industry Q&As. The Long Beach Convention Center is at 300 E Ocean Blvd, minutes from the waterfront. Weekend and single-day passes available online in advance.

Geekin Out Pop Culture Convention — La Mirada August 2026

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Geekin Out Pop Culture Convention — La Mirada August 2026

Aug 8, 2026 Holiday Inn La Mirada, 14299 Fires…

Geekin Out is Southern California's ultimate toy and pop culture convention, held at the Holiday Inn La Mirada on August 8, 2026. Organized by Toy Depot, this one-day convention brings together collectors and fans of vintage toys, action figures, comics, retro video games, rare collectibles, and pop culture memorabilia from across the decades. The convention floor features vendors specializing in everything from original 1980s action figures and vintage board games to modern collectible figures and custom fan art. A Creator Alley gives independent artists and craftspeople dedicated space to sell original work directly to attendees. The event is family-friendly, with free parking in the hotel lot. Geekin Out hits a specific collector sweet spot that larger conventions miss — it is focused enough to attract serious collectors with deep inventory, but accessible enough for casual fans who want to browse. The La Mirada location makes it a convenient option for collectors from the South Bay, Orange County, and the San Gabriel Valley. Doors open at 9am, convention runs until 6pm. Advance ticket pricing available through Eventbrite.

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37 days away

San Diego Anime Con 2026

Aug 8 – Aug 10, 2026 Town and Country Resort, 500 Hotel…

The anime community deserves a weekend that is theirs, not the overflow from someone else's convention. San Diego Anime Con was built on exactly that conviction -- depth over spectacle. While Comic-Con dominates the Convention Center in July, SDAC gives anime fans their own room at the Town and Country Resort: panels on currently airing series, cosplay contests judged by working cosplayers, an artist alley where fan artists sell original prints, and screenings of films that will not hit US streaming for months. No Hollywood panels competing for attention. No six-hour Hall H lines. Just anime -- the shows, the art, the community, the culture. The Town and Country offers on-site parking and hotel rooms for out-of-towners making a weekend of it. August 8-10, 2026. Registration required; badges available online.

Little Tokyo Anime and Culture Night -- Los Angeles August 2026

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Little Tokyo Anime and Culture Night -- Los Angeles August 2026

Aug 8, 2026 327 E 2nd St, Los Angeles, CA 90012

Little Tokyo in downtown Los Angeles is the oldest Japanese American community in the country and on weekend evenings it functions as the unofficial gathering point for LA-area anime and Japanese culture fans. The stretch of 1st and 2nd Street between Central and Alameda runs izakayas, ramen shops, Anime Jungle with dedicated anime merchandise, Kinokuniya Books, and coffee shops where people sit for hours discussing shows. The monthly Anime and Culture Night draws the community that lives here year-round, not just the convention crowd that shows up twice a year. Street performers, pop-up cosplay groups, and informal meetups fill the sidewalks from early evening into the night. Browse Anime Jungle for figures, tapestries, and limited releases. Kinokuniya carries Japanese-language manga, artbooks, and music releases alongside English-language anime. The ramen spots fill up fast. Arriving by 6:30pm avoids the longest waits at Ichiran, Daikokuya, and Shin-Sen-Gumi. The Metro Gold Line stops at Little Tokyo/Arts District station. Street parking is available on surrounding blocks. No ticket or registration required. Monthly on the second Saturday.

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43 days away

MTG The Hobbit — Tabletop Release Day

Aug 14, 2026 Local Game Shops — SoCal

Local game shops across SoCal. August 14th. Magic: The Gathering's The Hobbit set — the collaboration between Magic's card design and Tolkien's foundational fantasy narrative — arrives at retail on Release Day, the Friday when the shelves open and the sealed product is finally available to crack open. The Hobbit IP brings Middle-earth into Magic's card frame, which means every card is readable at two levels simultaneously: the mechanical function and the character or moment from the books that inspired it. Gandalf, Bilbo, the dragon, the dwarves — the lore is built into the design, and pulling a favorite character has an extra dimension beyond what the card does in the game. Find your local SoCal game store at magic.wizards.com and check their Release Day events for August 14th. The first weekend of a new set is when the community gathers to figure out what everything actually does at the table — the theory meets the card for the first time. Bring your deck-building instincts. Expect the set to surprise you. Release Day is when the Unexpected Journey begins for real.

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34 Gathering

44 days away

IchigoCon Gaming and Anime Convention

Aug 15, 2026 $15-25 Oxnard Performing Arts Center, 800…

IchigoCon returns to the Oxnard Performing Arts Center on August 15, 2026 — Ventura County's own gaming and anime convention, $15-25 entry, one day packed with tournaments, screenings, voice actor guests, cosplay, and vendors. Ventura County has needed this event. The nearest alternatives are San Diego and Los Angeles, which means a drive and a crowd. IchigoCon is the version that belongs to the community that built it: smaller, more personal, run by people who actually care about the fandoms on the floor. The voice actor guests do signing tables you can reach without a three-hour wait. The gaming tournament bracket is competitive but accessible — register at the door. The vendor section mixes anime merch with local artist prints and handmade goods. The Oxnard Performing Arts Center handles the event well — good parking, air conditioning, a layout that keeps the different program tracks from colliding. Day pass $15-25 at the door. This is the local show that deserves more attention than it gets, which is exactly the kind of event that tends to grow year by year.

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IchigoCon 2026 — Gaming + Anime Oxnard

Aug 15, 2026 Oxnard Performing Arts Center, 800…

IchigoCon is one of Ventura County's most beloved annual events — a community-run anime and gaming convention that proves you do not need to be in LA or San Diego to have a world-class fandom gathering. Organized by the Oxnard Performing Arts Center nonprofit, IchigoCon has a rare combination of professional production quality and genuine grassroots heart. The convention brings together gaming tournaments, anime screenings, voice actor guests, a vendor hall, and cosplay competition in a single-day format that is intense, fun, and extremely well-organized. The OPAC venue gives it a legitimate arts and culture weight that most hotel-con or expo-hall events do not have. For fans in Ventura County, Santa Barbara, and the western San Fernando Valley, IchigoCon is the home con — the place where local fandom communities actually form rather than just gathering in a crowd. August 15 in Oxnard. Tickets available on Eventbrite. Cosplay contest registration opens closer to the event date.

Anime Temecula Valley — Monthly Meetup August 2026

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45 days away

Anime Temecula Valley — Monthly Meetup August 2026

Aug 16, 2026 Promenade Temecula, 40820 Winchest…

August anime meetup for the Temecula Valley fan community — the summer stretch where the season is deep enough that everyone's got opinions and the con schedules have settled into something manageable. Open to newcomers. Bring your merch, your rankings, and your grievances about the shows that got cancelled before the arc resolved.

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80 Gathering

49 days away

Anime NYC 2026

Aug 20 – Nov 22, 2026 From $175 Javits Center, New York, NY 10001

The East Coast doesn't have Anime Expo. It built Anime NYC — and for the community on the right side of the country, that distinction matters. Javits Center, November 20-22, 2026. Three days, one convention floor, and the crowd that traveled 400 miles to be in the same room as guests who shaped the shows they grew up on. Panels, artist alley, industry announcements, the con floor energy that only happens when this many people are this invested. The guest roster pulls from English and Japanese voice acting, manga artists, and industry figures who don't appear at US conventions often. Artist Alley is one of the larger ones on the East Coast circuit. The show floor runs exhibitors across the full range — merchandise, media, collectibles. Badges from $175. New York City is the venue around the venue — the community migrates through Midtown after hours. The East Coast convention that became its own thing.

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🌎 Nation's Best 49 days away

Anime NYC 2026 - New York, NY

Aug 20 – Aug 23, 2026 Jacob K. Javits Convention Center,…

The Javits Center in August. Four days, 150,000 attendees — the largest anime convention on the East Coast. It started in 2017 as a regional alternative to AX and became something much larger. The Javits Center in August feels like a contained version of the anime internet made physical. Cosplay is everywhere and serious -- the craftsmanship people bring to their costumes is a form of artistic expression that deserves its own category. The exhibition hall has major publishers like Crunchyroll, Yen Press, and Nakama Press launching titles; creator meet-and-greets and autograph lotteries for guests like Yuji Kaku of Jujutsu Kaisen fill up in hours. Over 150 hours of programming runs simultaneously across panels, screenings, and Q-and-A sessions with creators. The New York City setting amplifies everything -- the crowd has NYC energy, the restaurants outside are excellent, and the convention benefits from the cultural infrastructure of the country's most connected city. Anime NYC is worth it for anyone serious about anime or manga culture. For East Coast fans who have not made the trip to Anime Expo in Los Angeles, this is the domestic pilgrimage -- the place where the industry treats you as a primary audience rather than a secondary market. For fans of specific titles, the autograph lotteries for major creators are reasons unto themselves. The 2026 edition adds a Family Zone presented by Scholastic and a Kids Sunday ticket for ages 6 to 12 -- signaling the generational shift already underway. This is not for people who want a casual festival atmosphere. It is for people who know their fandoms, track release schedules, and understand why certain announcements matter. Badge prices increase after May 31 -- purchase now if you are going. Bring a refillable water bottle; drinks inside run $4 and up with free fill stations throughout the Javits. Skip the Javits Starbucks and use the Hudson Yards location a short walk away. Walk Artist Alley and the Exhibition Hall completely once without buying -- collect business cards, compare prices, note everything -- then return to purchase. Autograph lotteries for top guests fill fast; register the moment they open. Bathrooms near the Expo Floor and Artist Alley get congested by midday; plan accordingly. Anime NYC's rise to East Coast dominance reflects something real: anime is no longer a niche import. It is one of the primary storytelling languages of a generation that grew up watching Naruto, reading One Piece, and building identities around the worlds attached to those stories. Anime NYC is where that generation convenes, where Japanese creators recognize their American audience in person, and where the next phase of the culture gets seeded. The Family Zone added in 2026 signals what is already happening: this is a mainstream cultural institution that happens to be run by and for people who care deeply about the craft. Badges at animenyc.com.

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