naeruto

Naruto (ナルト)

The only way we can really objectively judge their popularity is by comparing how active each respective pairing is in the fandom, in both Western and Japanese online Social Media. So in light of that, these are the search results for both the Japanese and the Western fandoms on Pixiv, Deviant Art and Google, as of February 22nd 2017:

Pixiv Japan:

SasuSaku (サスサク) - 11,267, SakuSasu (サクサス) - 46 = 11,313

NaruHina (ナルヒナ) - 4,843, HinaNaru (ヒナナル) - 22 = 4,865

SS more popular by a difference of 6,448

Pixiv Western:

SasuSaku - 954, SakuSasu - 5 = 959

NaruHina - 792, HinaNaru - 3 = 795

SS more popular by a difference of 164

Deviant Art is essentially non-existent in the Japanese fandom, so I won’t bother including those results. On the other hand…

Deviant Art Western:

SasuSaku - 65,933, SakuSasu - 5,587 = 71,520

NaruHina - 74,370, HinaNaru - 5,007 = 79,377

NH more popular by a difference of 7,857

Google Japan:

SasuSaku (サスサク) - 320,000, SakuSasu (サクサス) - 35,600 = 355,600

NaruHina (ナルヒナ) - 216,000, HinaNaru (ヒナナル) - 10,100 = 226,100

SS more popular by a difference of 129,500

Google Western:

SasuSaku - 5,220,000, SakuSasu - 95,700 = 5,315,700

NaruHina - 4,940,000, HinaNaru - 84,300 = 5,024,300

SS more popular by a difference of 291,400

So according to those results, SS has more than double NH’s results on Pixiv Japan and is also more popular on the Western version. NH is more popular on the Western Deviant Art, but SS again has NH beat for both the Japanese and the Western versions of the Google searches.

In addition to all of that:

SS won The 2015 Couples Bracket Tournament (directly beating NH in the process)

SS was placed at #7 for The Most Reblogged Ships in 2015, where NH was placed at #17

SS was placed at #14 for The Most Reblogged Ships in 2016, whereas NH wasn’t in the top 20 anymore

And SS was also the only Naruto ship to be included in Infographic’s list of The 50 Most Popular Ships in Fandom Culture.

Naruto Shippuden Episode - 494

sensei said I had to give it to the one I loved the most, niichan!

me: