The following contains light spoilers for the Solo Leveling manhwa.
Solo Leveling Season 2 may have drawn to a close, but the series is far from finished. Based on a light novel series that was later adapted into a beloved manhwa, the story of Solo Leveling is nowhere near its ending as of Season 2’s completion. Considering the immense popularity of the anime which has only grown due to the even greater quality of Season 2 over the first season, Solo Leveling fans can rest assured that there is more of the Solo Leveling anime to come.
But exactly how much more of Solo Leveling will anime fans get? That’s the really question that the fandom is likely to be asking as of the absolute cinema that was Season 2. Unlike Season 1, unfortunately, which immediately confirmed a Season 2 was in the works following its final episode, Season 2 gave no such confirmation for Season 3 of the anime. The positive side is that it would take multiple anime seasons to cover the entire story told in Solo Leveling’s manhwa.
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Solo Leveling Season 3 Will Begin With Volume 8 of the Manhwa
TSeason 2 Ended Exactly At the End of Volume 7 With the Jeju Island Raid in the Rearview
The Solo Leveling manhwa’s story is already entirely complete. The manhwa concludes with volume 13, consisting of 179 chapters total, telling the full story as it was originally told in Chugong’s Only I Level Up light novel. Notably, this does not include the epilogue, which was released after the original webtoon and comprises an extra 20 chapters of its own. Nevertheless, considering the 13 volumes of the manga that tell the main storyline of the series, there is still a lot of ground to cover that the anime hasn’t even scratched the surface of as of Solo Leveling Season 2’s finale.
Including the epilogue, Solo Leveling’s entire manhwa story is 200 chapters long. Solo Leveling Season 2 ended at manhwa chapter 110, just slightly over halfway through the entire storyline. Solo Leveling Season 2, Episode 7 (Episode 19 overall) ended at exactly the end point of Volume 5 of the manhwa. 6 episodes later, Season 2, Episode 13 concluded Volume 7. This indicates the current pace of the series is adapting a single volume in around 3 or 4 episodes. With 13 episodes expected in Season 3, this would leave more than enough space to easily complete at least Volumes 10 to 11.
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Importantly, Solo Leveling Volume 11 marks the definitive start to the final major war between good and evil with the fate of the world at stake. This would be the perfect place to lead into Season 4, giving the anime plenty of time to embellish on the action substantially. Ending with time to spare might even allow time for the final few episodes of Season 4 to adapt the manhwa’s epilogue. The only potential issue is that the series would need to maintain a brisk pacing which could result in cutting some memorable (though minor) scenes from the manhwa.
Cut and skipped scenes have been the single largest source of criticism directed at the anime from fans of the manhwa. Generally, the anime has remained extremely faithful to the source material in terms of its storyline, with the most major deviation being in Jinwoo’s personality. In the manhwa. Jinwoo is a bit more serious and edgy as an anti-hero, whereas the anime humanizes him and makes him more redeemable and heroic. This change has little to do with the actual chapters the manhwa covers, though, and doesn’t really have a substantial effect on the overall storyline regarding the major conflicts and villains.
Solo Leveling Will Need At Least Four Seasons to Complete The Manhwa
The Anime is Adapting Around 3 1/2 Volumes Per Season
Solo Leveling‘s anime just completed volume 7 with Season 2’s conclusion. This means the anime has been moving at a pace of 3 1/2 volumes per season. If the series remains at this pace, Season 3 will end around half-way through Volume 10, which would actually be a fairly reasonable place to end off the story before it heads into the endgame. The entire manhwa is a total of 13 volumes, so at a pace of roughly 3 1/2 volumes per season, Solo Leveling‘s anime could easily end with 4 seasons while still having plenty of space to add details and expand on character arcs as it has done with its previous two seasons.
On the other hand, the anime has moved at an impressively brisk pace, often removing more minor manhwa details in the interest of getting to the most important parts (which are usually the fights). If Season 3 were to end midway through Volume 10, the anime would be able to finish the series with Season 4 without any issues. However, the one thing missing from Volume 13 is the epilogue, which consists of 21 chapters that were released after the original ending at Chapter 179.
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While Season 4 would technically end the initial story of the manhwa, this doesn’t mean the additional 21 chapters of the epilogue aren’t canon. These are storylines present in the original light novel as well, and they organically set up the story for the sequel series, Solo Leveling: Ragnarok. Each volume of the manhwa is around 20 chapters, making the epilogue just about long enough to fill an entire volume of its own. Given the pacing of 3 or so episodes per volume, it would actually make perfect sense for the series to adapt the epilogue of Solo Leveling as a movie at the end of the series, rather than just adapting it into a full season. One episode of Solo Leveling is around 23 minutes, making 3 episodes 70 minutes total, which would be more than enough for a feature film.
The Series Could Continue For Even Longer By Adapting Solo Leveling: Ragnarok
Solo Leveling’s Sequel Manhwa and Light Novel Are Still Ongoing
Notably, Japanese voice actor of Sung Jinwoo, Taito Ban, stated during an interview with Gamerbraves that the series could feasibly continue for five seasons and have “maybe even a movie in the works”. While he could have just said this as a means of being optimistic, if taken at face value, this indicates the series’ lead voice actor sees the merit in slowing down the pacing of the series and potentially filling in the blanks with a film. Solo Leveling’s epilogue is the perfect length for a feature film, but there’s also another way it could fit into a new season. Namely, if it was made to fit naturally into the story of Solo Leveling’s sequel, Ragnarok.
While Solo Leveling has long ended, the Ragnarok manhwa is only still at the start of the story. In fact, Solo Leveling: Ragnarok light novel author Daul has even stated that the series is still only in the epilogue of the original Solo Leveling story, and hasn’t even reached the “prologue” of the sequel yet – despite the light novel being over 300 chapters in. In contrast, the Ragnarok manhwa is only just over 30 chapters in, and has barely scratched the surface of the light novel’s story so far. It’s clear there’s a lot more story that both the light novel and manhwa haven’t even begin to reach. By the time Solo Leveling is finally complete by Season 4, Ragnarok will be quite far into its own storyline. This could potentially provide several more seasons of the SL sequel series, ensuring Solo Leveling continues for many years to come.
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While there is no current official confirmation of a Season 3 of Solo Leveling at this time, that doesn’t mean it won’t be returning. Solo Leveling Season 2 was easily the most popular anime of the Winter 2025 season, breaking innumerable records for Crunchyroll with the release of each new episode. After releasing 2 seasons of the series back to back in 2 years, it wouldn’t be at all out of the ordinary for the anime to take a bit of a break before it moves into the second half of Sung Jinwoo’s story. An optimistic expectation for when Season 3 of Solo Leveling could come out would be in January 2026, falling in line with its previous release schedule. However, it wouldn’t also make sense for the series to take a break for a year and come back with its next two seasons back-to-back in 2027 and 2028.
After an unbelievably successful second season, Solo Leveling concludes the first half of its story as one of the biggest anime on the planet. Considering the noticeable boost in quality fans saw between Seasons 1 & 2, it wouldn’t be a shock to see Solo Leveling’s third season looking even better than ever. To that end, fans should welcome A-1 Pictures taking their time with the next half of the series, as they prepare to make the most action-packed arcs of the story look the best they possibly can. It may take a little longer for the next season to come out than Season 2 did, but fans can at least rest assured that the Solo Leveling anime has (at minimum) 2 more seasons worth of manhwa content to work with.
Solo Leveling Season 2 is currently streaming on Crunchyroll.
- Release Date
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January 7, 2024
- Directors
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Shunsuke Nakashige
- Writers
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Noboru Kimura
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Taito Ban
Shun Mizushino (voice)
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Genta Nakamura
Kenta Morobishi (voice)
