Two announcements landed three weeks apart, and together they left fans arguing about arithmetic. On June 10, 2026, D&C Media, the Korean publisher behind the original webtoon, told investors in an earnings briefing that a third season of the Solo Leveling anime is confirmed, with a broadcast target somewhere in 2027 or 2028. Then on July 3, at the Crunchyroll panel at Anime Expo in Los Angeles, Aniplex and Crunchyroll announced a theatrical film called Solo Leveling: Beyond the System, described as a new story continuing after season 2.
So which is it? A season, a movie, or a movie that is the season?
The teaser did not settle it. Aniplex and Sony posted a version ending on the card โSolo Leveling / The Movieโ. The version Crunchyroll posted ended on โSolo Leveling S3 / The Movieโ. Viewers screenshotted the difference and passed it around X and Reddit, and the S3 line was removed from Crunchyrollโs upload without a statement. Nobody involved has explained the edit.
Here is what is settled. The anime is animated by A-1 Pictures, directed by Shunsuke Nakashige, with series composition by Noboru Kimura, character designs by Tomoko Sudo and music by Hiroyuki Sawano. Season 1 ran 12 episodes from January 7 to March 31, 2024. Season 2, subtitled Arise from the Shadow, ran 13 episodes from January 5 to March 30, 2025. That is 25 episodes of television so far. Season 1 opened with โLEveLโ by SawanoHiroyuki[nZk]:TOMORROW X TOGETHER and closed with โrequestโ by Krage; season 2 used โReAwakerโ by LiSA featuring Felix of Stray Kids, and โUN-APEXโ by TK from Ling Tosite Sigure.
Between the two seasons sat a third thing that also played in cinemas, which is part of why the current confusion is so easy to fall into. Solo Leveling -ReAwakening- screened in Japan from November 29 to December 12, 2024, and Crunchyroll brought it to North American theaters on December 6. It was a recap film: season 1 recut into a feature, with the first two episodes of season 2 attached to the end. Japanese studios do this routinely as a promotional bridge between seasons. Beyond the System is not that. It is new animation covering material past the end of season 2.
In between the recap and the announcements came the awards. At the Crunchyroll Anime Awards on May 25, 2025, held at the Grand Prince Hotel New Takanawa in Tokyo, Solo Leveling took 9 wins from 13 nominations: Anime of the Year, Best New Series, Best Action, Best Main Character for Sung Jin-woo, Best Score for Hiroyuki Sawano, Best Opening Sequence, Best Ending Sequence, and two voice acting awards, English for Aleks Le and Castilian Spanish for Masumi Mutsuda. The top prize was widely read as an upset on the night, since most predictions had gone elsewhere.
The film keeps much of the season 2 team. Tao Tajima directs, and is also credited as director of photography, editor and colorist. Tomoko Sudo returns on character design, Hiroyuki Sawano on music, A-1 Pictures on animation. Crunchyroll, Aniplex, Netmarble, D&C Media and Kakao Piccoma are co-producing. No release date has been given.
If you are starting now, the 25 aired episodes are on Crunchyroll in most territories and on Netflix in Korea. If you finish them and cannot wait, the webtoon has been complete since 2021 and carries the story well past where the anime stopped, which is a fine option as long as you are comfortable knowing what the film will animate before you see it. Whether Beyond the System is episode one of season 3 remains unanswered by everyone in a position to answer it. (As of August 22, 2026)
