When Will New Boruto Dub Come Out?
When Will New Boruto Dub Come Out?
With the conclusion of the Kawaki Arc, western fans of the English dub of Boruto have once again been left scratching their heads. With minimal communication between Japanese producers and Western distributors and even less between those distributors and audiences, the following information is currently available regarding the upcoming release of Boruto’s dub.
As is often the case, the history of Boruto’s English dub is controversial, with fans having been subjected to restarts, contract changes, and even streaming issues. Due to a combination of unexpectedly poor Western ratings, a precarious global distribution partnership, and a massive Covid-19 delay, the English adaptation of Boruto has left many viewers in limbo.
How Many Episodes Are Dubbed In English?
The controversy surrounding the English dub of Boruto began with its initial distribution by Adult Swim, who released the first 52 episodes on Toonami before pulling the series from the block. After being forced to resume the distribution due to VIZ Media’s home-release timetable and a COVID-19 delay, the Boruto dub was sluggish. Initially, the dub had a reasonable 50-ish episode gap between its subtitled counterpart.
Up until episode 189, the English dub of Boruto has been available via the aforementioned VIZ system’s box set collections. The average dubbed Boruto box set has thirteen episodes and costs between $45.00 and $50.00. Thankfully, internet streaming services have recently begun to accelerate the release of English-dubbed episodes. It is currently difficult to predict if and when additional Boruto episodes will be dubbed in 2023.
Where to Stream the Boruto English Dub
Despite the consistent publication of dubbed Boruto episodes by VIZ — up to the “The Vessel” story arc as of this writing — many fans are unable to stream the dubbed episodes, even through paid streaming platforms. Frequently, reputable outlets offer a limited number of episodes of the dub, leading people to erroneously conclude that production has halted entirely. However, licensing concerns are often to blame.
Hulu, which is owned and operated by Disney, appears to have previously dissatisfied fans of the Boruto dub. Hulu initially received a barrage of criticism for its subpar distribution of the English dub. Since its January 2021 announcement, Hulu has begun to keep up with demand. Hulu has uploaded dubbed episodes through episode 155, “Mitsuki’s Rainy Day,” as of this moment.
There have been allegations of the unilateral addition and subsequent removal of licensed Boruto episodes, resulting in a decline in the fortunes of many Funimation subscribers in international countries. Due to the acquisition of Madman, Funimation has abolished the prior platform, AnimeLab, and now offers only irregular dub episodes from the whole collection, or none at all in some territories.
Currently, 189 of the current 274 episodes of Boruto’s dub are available as box sets. Currently, only 155 dubbed episodes are accessible on Hulu. This means that English-speaking consumers who prefer streaming will have to wait to catch up on more than 120 un-dubbed episodes published to date.
