Best Manga Like DanMachi for Dungeon-Crawling and RPG Fantasy Fans
If you’re looking for manga like DanMachi, you’re chasing a very specific cocktail: an underdog protagonist grinding through monster-filled dungeon floors, RPG-style stats and skill growth, guild life full of colorful personalities, party dynamics that actually matter, and just enough romantic comedy to keep things light. Is It Wrong to Try to Pick Up Girls in a Dungeon? — DanMachi for short — nails every one of those elements. The manga adaptation, written by Fujino Omori and published in English by Yen Press across 10 volumes, captures it all in a tight, completed run.
For anyone new to the term, “isekai” is a Japanese genre label meaning “another world” — stories where a character is transported, reincarnated, or otherwise dropped into a fantasy world, usually one that runs on RPG video game logic (think leveling up, earning skills, and fighting monsters). DanMachi isn’t technically isekai — its hero, Bell Cranel, a young adventurer who dreams of becoming strong enough to stand beside the gods, was born in his world rather than transported there. But the feel of DanMachi overlaps so heavily with isekai manga that fans of one almost always love the other. Dungeon exploration, leveling systems, party-building, adventurer guilds — these are isekai staples, and DanMachi leans into every single one.
The eight manga below all scratch a specific DanMachi itch. Here’s a quick scan of what’s coming:
- Arifureta — Dungeon survival pushed to the extreme
- Skeleton Knight in Another World — Overpowered adventurer guild life with comedy
- Let This Grieving Soul Retire — Party comedy meets guild adventures
- That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime — Building power from the weakest starting point
- The Rising of the Shield Hero — Summoned hero levels up from nothing
- Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation — Adventurer life in a deeply built world
- So I’m a Spider, So What? — Pure dungeon-crawling survival
- Overlord — RPG mechanics from the dungeon boss’s perspective
Every pick is available in English and has an anime adaptation, so you can watch a few episodes as a preview if you want — but the manga versions are what we’re here for, and each section below focuses on why the manga is worth your shelf space.
Arifureta: From Commonplace to World’s Strongest — Dungeon Survival Pushed to the Limit
If you love DanMachi for the moments when Bell is outmatched, cornered, and fighting for his life on a dungeon floor way above his level — Arifureta takes that feeling and cranks it up.
The setup: an entire high school class gets summoned to another world as heroes. Hajime Nagumo is the weakest of them all, with a noncombat “Synergist” class (essentially a crafter, not a fighter) that earns him nothing but mockery. Then he’s betrayed and knocked into the deepest abyss of a deadly labyrinth. Alone. No party. No healer. Just monsters that could flatten him and a desperate will to survive.
What follows is one of the most satisfying underdog-to-overpowered story arcs in isekai manga. Hajime eats monster flesh to gain abilities, crafts weapons from dungeon materials, and claws his way back to the surface as a completely different person — cold, ruthless, and absurdly strong. Along the way, he picks up powerful companions who become a growing harem — a recurring cast of romantic interests orbiting the protagonist, which is another thing DanMachi fans will recognize immediately.
The dungeon-crawling sections are intense. Unlike DanMachi’s relatively structured dungeon beneath the city of Orario — where adventurers tackle floors in an organized system — Arifureta’s labyrinths feel genuinely hostile. It’s survival horror mixed with power fantasy. The RPG mechanics are there (stats, skills, level-ups), but the tone is grittier and the stakes feel higher in those early chapters.
The manga is ongoing and published in English by Seven Seas Entertainment, with 16 volumes available. There’s also an anime adaptation if you want a preview before committing to the manga. Fair warning: the anime covers the story at a different pace, so the manga offers significantly more detail in the dungeon sequences.
For DanMachi fans who wanted Bell’s early struggles to last longer and hit harder, Arifureta delivers exactly that.
Skeleton Knight in Another World — Overpowered Adventurer Guild Life
Where Arifureta shares DanMachi’s underdog survival, Skeleton Knight shares its fun. This is adventurer guild life played for maximum enjoyment — quests, party members, dungeon exploration, and a protagonist who’s having a great time despite a very weird problem.
Arc wakes up inside the game world he was playing, but there’s a catch: he’s stuck in his character’s skeleton knight avatar. Full plate armor? Check. Devastating combat abilities? Absolutely. But underneath the helmet, he’s literally a skeleton. So he has to navigate guild life, take on quests, and interact with people while carefully hiding the fact that he’s, well, dead.
The comedy here is warm and character-driven, similar to the lighter moments in DanMachi when Bell stumbles through social situations with goddesses and fellow adventurers. Arc is overpowered from the start — this isn’t an underdog story — but the fun comes from watching him try to blend in, help people, and explore a world that feels genuinely lived-in.
The action is solid too. Arc’s fights are flashy and satisfying, and the dungeon encounters scratch that same exploration itch that DanMachi’s floor-clearing delivers. The adventurer guild serves as a natural hub for quests and party formation, giving the story that same structured-adventure feel.
The manga is ongoing, published by Seven Seas Entertainment, with 14 English volumes released so far. An anime adaptation is also available and captures the series’ balance of action and comedy well.
Skeleton Knight in Another World, Vol. 14
If you want DanMachi’s guild atmosphere and dungeon fun but with a protagonist who’s already powerful and just vibing through it all, Skeleton Knight is a great fit. The comedic tone and likeable cast make it easy to binge through, and the volumes keep coming at a steady pace.
Let This Grieving Soul Retire — Party Comedy Meets Guild Adventures
This one flips DanMachi’s underdog premise on its head in the funniest way possible.
Krai Andrey is convinced he’s a weak, mediocre adventurer who somehow keeps getting dragged into terrifying situations. The joke? He’s actually incredibly strong. He just has absolutely no idea, and neither does the audience at first. He “accidentally” leads the most powerful party in the guild while spending every battle convinced he’s about to die.
If Bell Cranel’s charm is his earnest desire to grow stronger, Krai’s charm is his equally earnest desire to retire. He doesn’t want glory. He doesn’t want to fight powerful monsters. He wants to go home. But the universe — and his absurdly talented party members — won’t let him.
The party dynamics are where this manga shines for DanMachi fans. Like Bell’s relationships with his Familia (the god-led adventurer families that form DanMachi’s social structure) and allies, the interactions between Krai and his party members carry the emotional weight of the story. There’s genuine affection underneath the comedy, and the group’s bonds deepen in satisfying ways as the action escalates.
Guild-based adventuring drives the plot structure, so you get that same rhythm of quest acceptance, preparation, and dungeon diving that makes DanMachi’s world feel so engaging. The comedy-to-action ratio leans more toward comedy than DanMachi does, but when the fights happen, they land well.
The manga is ongoing, published by Yen Press, with 10 English volumes out. An anime adaptation has also aired. The humor works well in both formats, though the manga’s comedic timing in panel layouts is particularly good.
For DanMachi fans who love the party camaraderie and guild atmosphere but want more laughs, this one is a gem.
That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime — Building Power From the Bottom Up
Few manga capture the “start from nothing and become unstoppable” fantasy as well as Slime does. And that growth arc — from the absolute bottom to the top — is the heartbeat of what makes DanMachi so satisfying.
Satoru Mikami dies and reincarnates as a slime. Not a dragon, not a hero — a slime. The weakest, most generic RPG monster imaginable. But through a unique skill that lets him absorb and copy the abilities of anything he consumes, he rapidly transforms from helpless blob into one of the most powerful beings in his new world.
The RPG mechanics are front and center. Skills have names, levels matter, evolution trees branch out, and there’s a systematic logic to how power works. DanMachi fans who love Bell’s stat growth — tracked through the Falna, a divine blessing that records an adventurer’s abilities like a character sheet in a video game — will feel right at home here. The progression is constant and deeply satisfying, and every new skill or evolution feels earned.
Where Slime expands beyond DanMachi is in scale. Rimuru (the slime’s new name) doesn’t just level up — he builds an entire nation. He gathers allies from every monster race, negotiates with kingdoms, and constructs a civilization from scratch. The “party” in this case is an entire country of loyal companions, each with their own personality and power set.
The manga is a long-running series published in English by Kodansha, with a hugely popular anime adaptation. The anime is often the entry point for new fans, but the manga offers more detailed world-building and political maneuvering that the anime sometimes breezes through.
If DanMachi’s skill growth and monster encounters are what hook you, Slime takes those elements and builds an entire world around them.
The Rising of the Shield Hero — Summoned Hero Levels Up From Nothing
Shield Hero is probably the most direct parallel to DanMachi’s core appeal: an underdog protagonist who starts at the very bottom and has to grind his way to strength while the world actively works against him.
Naofumi Iwatani is summoned to another world as one of four Cardinal Heroes — legendary warriors each bound to a single sacred weapon. His weapon? A shield. No sword, no spear, no bow — just a shield. And then, before he can even get started, he’s framed for a crime he didn’t commit, stripped of his resources and reputation, and left to fend for himself with zero combat ability and zero allies.
The parallels to Bell’s early DanMachi struggles are clear, but Shield Hero is darker. A heads-up on tone: the betrayal is harsh, the world is hostile, and Naofumi’s bitterness feels justified. If you’re coming from DanMachi’s warmly heroic Bell Cranel, know that Shield Hero’s protagonist starts from a much angrier place. His growth isn’t just about getting stronger — it’s about rebuilding trust, finding people worth protecting, and proving everyone wrong. The party-building aspect is especially strong here, as each companion Naofumi recruits becomes deeply important to him and to the story.
RPG mechanics drive the power system. Naofumi’s shield evolves through absorbing materials (similar to leveling up in a game), and the Wave system — periodic apocalyptic monster invasions — creates escalating threats that force the heroes to push beyond their current limits, much like DanMachi’s increasingly dangerous dungeon floors.
The manga is published in English by One Peace Books, with a well-known anime adaptation that brought the series massive international attention. The manga digs deeper into the world’s mechanics and Naofumi’s internal struggle than the anime can in its runtime.
For DanMachi fans who want the underdog growth fantasy with higher emotional stakes and a protagonist who earns every inch of progress through sheer stubbornness, Shield Hero is a natural next read.
Mushoku Tensei: Jobless Reincarnation — Adventurer Life in a Rich Fantasy World
If DanMachi’s world-building is what captivates you — the way its city of Orario feels like a real place with real guilds, real economies, and real social hierarchies — then Mushoku Tensei’s world might genuinely blow you away.
Rudeus Greyrat is reincarnated as a baby in a fantasy world and grows up from childhood, learning magic, combat, and social skills over years of in-story time. This isn’t a power fantasy where the protagonist is immediately strong — it’s a slow burn. Rudeus joins adventurer parties, explores dangerous regions, and dives into dungeons as part of a life that unfolds gradually and naturally.
The adventurer lifestyle and party dynamics will feel immediately familiar to DanMachi fans. Rudeus’s party members aren’t just combat tools — they have their own goals, flaws, and growth arcs (the story stretches and turning points that define a character’s development over many volumes). The relationships between party members develop over volumes — each volume being a single collected book of manga chapters — in ways that reward patient reading.
The world itself is remarkable. The magic system has internal rules and limitations. Geography matters. Different cultures have different values and power structures. Where DanMachi builds one city in deep detail, Mushoku Tensei builds an entire continent. The dungeon sequences, when they arrive, feel like dangerous expeditions into the unknown rather than routine grinding.
A note on content: Mushoku Tensei includes sexual content and scenes involving minors, particularly connected to its protagonist’s behavior in early volumes. It’s a deliberate character choice that the story addresses over time, but it’s worth knowing about before jumping in.
The manga is published in English by Seven Seas Entertainment, alongside the light novel (a Japanese format — essentially a short novel with occasional illustrations) source material. The anime adaptation is celebrated for its production quality and emotional depth. The manga works well as its own experience, particularly for readers who prefer visual storytelling.
For DanMachi fans who want more world-building, more character development, and don’t mind a slower pace to get there, Mushoku Tensei is an incredibly rewarding read.
So I’m a Spider, So What? — Pure Dungeon-Crawling Survival Isekai
If you could distill DanMachi down to its purest dungeon-crawling essence — just the protagonist, the monsters, and the desperate fight to survive one more floor — you’d get something very close to So I’m a Spider, So What?
An entire class is reincarnated into a fantasy world. Most of them become humans with comfortable new lives. Our protagonist? She becomes a tiny, weak spider at the bottom of an enormous labyrinth swarming with monsters that could eat her in one bite.
The early volumes are almost entirely dungeon survival. No allies, no guild, no shops — just a spider using every scrap of the game-like skill system to stay alive. She poisons things bigger than her, sets web traps, hides in crevices, and slowly — agonizingly slowly — levels up and evolves into stronger spider forms.
The RPG mechanics here are some of the most detailed and satisfying in any isekai manga. Every skill acquisition is a strategic choice. Every evolution branch — the branching paths a character can take when they level up, like a skill tree in a video game — matters. Every stat point feels significant. DanMachi fans who love Bell’s stat growth and skill development will find a kindred experience here, amplified by the constant life-or-death pressure of labyrinth survival.
What makes it special is the protagonist’s personality. Despite her terrifying situation, she maintains a running internal monologue that’s funny, self-aware, and endearing. She names her skills, celebrates small victories, and panics in ways that make even the most tense encounters entertaining.
The manga is published in English by Yen Press, with an anime adaptation also available. The manga format works particularly well for this series — the visual representation of the labyrinth environments and monster designs adds a lot to the survival tension.
For DanMachi fans who want dungeon crawling at its most raw and a leveling system at its most granular, this is the pick.
Overlord — Dungeon Crawling From the Boss’s Chair
What if you took DanMachi’s RPG-driven world and flipped the camera entirely? Instead of an underdog adventurer climbing the dungeon, you’re the all-powerful being sitting at the top, watching the adventurers come to you.
A fair warning before diving in: if you loved DanMachi for Bell Cranel’s warm heroism, Overlord is a sharp tonal shift. The protagonist here is closer to a villain than a hero, and the story leans into that. If you’re open to seeing the RPG fantasy formula from the opposite side, read on.
Momonga is a player who stays logged into his favorite MMORPG (a massively multiplayer online role-playing game — think large-scale online fantasy games where thousands of players share a world) as the servers shut down — and wakes up as his character, an elder lich (a powerful undead sorcerer), inside a fully realized version of the game world. His guild base, the Great Tomb of Nazarick, is a dungeon filled with loyal NPC (non-player character) servants who are now living, breathing beings devoted to him.
The dungeon exploration in Overlord works differently than DanMachi. Instead of climbing through monster-filled floors, Momonga sends his forces out into the world for political conquest, diplomatic manipulation, and strategic warfare. But the RPG skeleton is the same — classes, levels, skills, spells, and items all function according to game-like rules that DanMachi fans will immediately understand.
Where Overlord shines is in its world-building and the sheer depth of its power system. Momonga isn’t just strong — he’s a max-level player with deep knowledge of game mechanics. Watching him navigate political situations using his RPG knowledge while maintaining the facade of an all-knowing overlord is consistently entertaining.
The tone is darker than DanMachi. Momonga is a villain protagonist — or at least an antihero whose sense of morality shifts as he inhabits his undead form. Some encounters are genuinely unsettling. But the series balances this with dry humor and the absurd loyalty of his NPC guardians, who treat him as a god.
The manga is a long-running series published in English by Yen Press, with a popular anime adaptation. The light novel source material goes even deeper into the mechanics and political scheming, but the manga stands well on its own.
For DanMachi fans who’ve ever wondered what it would be like on the other side of the dungeon — to be the boss monster, the final floor, the thing adventurers fear — Overlord answers that question with style.
Quick Match Guide — Find Your Manga Like DanMachi Fix
Here’s a quick breakdown based on what you love most about DanMachi:
If you want intense dungeon crawling:
- Start with Arifureta for survival-horror dungeon intensity, or So I’m a Spider, So What? for the purest labyrinth-crawling experience in isekai manga.
If you want underdog growth:
- The Rising of the Shield Hero delivers the hardest-earned progression, while Arifureta offers the most dramatic zero-to-hero transformation.
If you want party and guild dynamics:
- Let This Grieving Soul Retire nails the comedic party chemistry, and Mushoku Tensei builds some of the deepest party relationships in the genre.
If you want comedy mixed with action:
- Skeleton Knight in Another World balances laughs and fights beautifully, and Let This Grieving Soul Retire makes comedy the central appeal.
If you want an overpowered protagonist:
- Overlord gives you world-domination-level power, and Skeleton Knight lets you enjoy being absurdly strong without the moral complexity.
If you want the richest world-building:
- Mushoku Tensei for continent-spanning depth, That Time I Got Reincarnated as a Slime for nation-building scope, and Overlord for intricate RPG-system world design.
The table below rates each series across five categories on a five-star scale. Five stars (★★★★★) means that element is a defining strength of the series; one star (★) means it’s minimal or absent.
| Series | Dungeon Focus | Underdog Arc | Party Dynamics | Comedy | Tone |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arifureta | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ | ★★★ | ★★ | Dark → Power Fantasy |
| Skeleton Knight | ★★★★ | ★ | ★★★★ | ★★★★★ | Light & Fun |
| Let This Grieving Soul Retire | ★★★ | ★★★ (inverted) | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ | Comedy-First |
| Slime | ★★★ | ★★★★ | ★★★★ | ★★★ | Warm & Optimistic |
| Shield Hero | ★★★ | ★★★★★ | ★★★★ | ★★ | Dark & Determined |
| Mushoku Tensei | ★★★ | ★★★★ | ★★★★★ | ★★★ | Mature & Gradual |
| Spider | ★★★★★ | ★★★★★ | ★ | ★★★★ | Tense & Funny |
| Overlord | ★★★ | ★ | ★★★ | ★★★ | Dark & Strategic |
All eight picks are available in English and have anime adaptations, so you can always watch a few episodes to preview the vibe before picking up volume 1. Happy reading!