Anime is extremely popular around the globe. As anime shows travel to new countries, they are often dubbed so new audiences can understand them. Some of the English dub actors have furthered the popularity of famed anime like Naruto, Dragon Ball Z, My Hero Academia, and so on in English-speaking countries.
Here are some of the best English-speaking anime voice actors around.
Sean Schemmel
The voice behind Goku in the Funimation dub for Dragon Ball Z is one of the most identifiable figures in the entire Dragon Ball fandom. However, other than Goku, he has also voiced other characters from the franchise like King Kai, Vegito, Gogeta, and Nail.
Along with anime like Fullmetal Alchemist, Yu-Gi-Oh, and One Piece, he also has a diverse filmography in non-Japanese animation, including Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles and the Winx Club. When it comes to Goku, his aggressive acting persona is unmatched, and he has voiced the character in every anime appearance.
Christopher Sabat
Vegeta. Yamcha. Piccolo. These are a few of Christopher Sabat's most popular characters for the Dragon Ball series. In recent years, Sabat has become synonymous with All-Might, the superhero from My Hero Academia who serves as a friend and mentor to the protagonist Izuku Midoriya.
Along with his voice roles, Sabat also serves as the director of OkraTron 5000, an audio production company that he himself founded. The company also collaborates with Funimation's dubs on several occasions.
Stephanie Nadolny
Stephanie Nadolny is perhaps best-known for providing the voice of both the child versions of Goku and his son Gohan in Dragon Ball and Dragon Ball Z, respectively, along with several video games and films that the franchise spawned. Nadolny's voice carried a youthful charm and naivety for both of the characters, adding to the coming-of-age themes in their story arcs.
The rest of her anime career included a few guest appearances in Case Closed and Yu Yu Hakusho, but none seem to match the level of her work as Goku and Gohan.
Justin Briner
My Hero Academia's lead, Izuku Midoriya, aka Deku, is arguably one of the most popular protagonists in the shonen subgenre of anime. Apart from voicing Midoriya, Justin Briner has voiced Kid Vegeta in Dragon Ball Super and Eve Tearm in Fairy Tail.
Compared to the other actors in this list, Briner started relatively late, with his first anime dub happening in 2015 when he voiced a character in Yona of the Dawn.
Maile Flanagan
Emmy-winner Maile Flanagan is the English voice actor for Naruto's titular ninja, and that one role would be enough to highlight her popularity. Other than Naruto and its spin-off Boruto, Flanagan has hardly voiced any other anime.
In fact, she's an accomplished character actor making mostly comedic appearances in films and TV shows, including the likes of 500 Days of Summer and Grey's Anatomy. Other voice-acting non-anime works include Rango, Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs, Astroboy, and so on.
J. Michael Tatum
J. Michael Tatum made his anime debut with a brief role in Initial D along with voicing the peasant warrior Rikichi in Samurai 7, a modernistic take on Akira Kurosawa's Seven Samurai. Tatum later gained fame as the voice of Erwin Smith in Attack on Titan, Eneru in One Piece, and Okabe Rintaro in Steins; Gate.
One of his recent ongoing roles is the rule-abiding Class 1-A monitor Tenya Iida in My Hero Academia. Additionally, Tatum is also an ADR director and scriptwriter for Funimation's dubs.
Monica Rial
Extremely popular among Dragon Ball fans as the voice of Bulma. However, even before she began voicing Bulma, Rial was involved with many Funimation dubs for titles like Neongenesis Evangelion, Blue Seed, and Fullmetal Alchemist. She voiced the characters Maya, Momiji, and Lyra in these respective anime.
Rial has also continuously played Bulma in most Dragon Ball games, the latest being 2020's Dragon Ball Z: Kakarot. She cites American animated shows like The Simpsons and Beavis and Butt-Head as major inspirations for her initial entry into voice-acting.
Johnny Yong Bosch
Johnny Yong Bosch is a popular voice actor who actually started his career with live-action productions, particularly Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, in which he portrayed the Black Ranger, Adam Park. Bosch's early anime voice credits included cult classics like the cyberpunk film Akira and the historical adventure anime Samurai Chimpaloo. Other major credits include Noby in Doraemon and Jonathan Joestar in JoJo's Bizarre Adventure.
Bosch also took over as the voice for Broly in the Dragon Ball series.
Bryce Papenbrook
Eren Jaeger in Attack On Titan. Kirito in Sword Art Online. Red in Pokemon Origins. These are some of Bryce Papenbrook's anime dubbing credits, apart from having a successful video game career. When it comes to the latter, Paperbrook has been the voice of Silver the Hedgehog in SEGA's Sonic The Hedgehog games since 2019.
His latest feature film credit includes the 2021 Demon Slayer film, Mugen Train, in which Papenbrook reprised his role as series protagonist Inosuke Hashibira.
Colleen Clinkenbeard
A regular ADR director and voice actress for Funimation, Colleen Clinkenbeard found her big break as Rachel Moore in Case Closed (Detective Conan). Since, then her most popular lead role as an anime dubber might be Monkey D. Luffy, the pirate protagonist of One Piece.
For Dragon Ball Z Kai, she voiced young Goku as well as Gohan. Her other prominent roles include the S-Class swordsman Ezra Scarlet in Fairy Tail and My Hero Academia's Momo Yaoyorozu, the superhuman with the 'Quirk' of creation.