Anime piracy website, AnimeKisa TV, recently announced that the site has voluntarily shut down due to a lack of funds after they removed ads from the website.

The staff revealed that after the removal of ads 18 months ago since its debut in 2018, AnimeKisa started a donation campaign to fund the website. However, those donations could only extend its life for a few months.

“If you’ve been here since a few months ago, you probably remember us running a donation campaign. Ever since we removed ads a year and a half ago (excluding third-party ones that are impossible to remove), AK’s wallet dried up, thanks to your donations we were able to extend AKs life for a few months,” wrote AnimeKisa.

They also stated that the website has closed permanently and “is never coming back online”.

Since most pirated websites collect revenue through ads, AnimeKisa advised its users to find better alternatives by avoiding AnimeKisa copycats infested with malicious ads and listing numerous pirate websites.

“AnimeKisa copycats are out there, and they’re often infested with the worst kinds of ads. AnimeKisa may shut down, but please don’t use the background imitation websites as there are much better alternatives, the above are some of them.”

According to the tracking service SimilarWeb, AnimeKisa had more than 18 million hits per month during the months of December 2021, January 2022, and February 2022.

“According to AnimeKisa announcement this week, it removed most ads about 18 months ago. Traffic estimates from SimilarWeb show a site in good health, with between 18 to 21 million visits per month in 2022 and a popular sub-Reddit and Discord channel for discussion. None of that could force people to donate, however.”

Source: Anime Motivation, AnimeKisa Official Site