Bishoujo Beauties

Bishojo (???, Bishojo? ; ??????; literally, "beautiful young girl", also spelled bishoujo) is a Japanese term used to refer to young and pretty girls, usually below university age. Bishoujo is not listed as a word in the prominent Japanese dictionary Kojien. A variant named biyojo (???, biyojo?) refers to a girl before the age of adolescence.

Bishojo are seen in almost all genres of anime and manga, especially dating sims and so-called harem anime. It is sometimes considered the most mild form of fanservice, particularly if older women would be more appropriate characters.

It is distinguished from the similar sounding shojo demographic by referring to the gender and traits of the characters, not the intended audience of a manga/anime: shojo is manga/anime for girls; bishojo is a pretty-girl type character.

Although bishojo is not a genre but a character type, series predominantly featuring such charactes are sometimes called "bishojo series". Since the main draws of these series are typically the art and the attractive female characters, the term is sometimes itself perceived negatively as a "genre" solely depending on its marketability of cute characters.