North American webtoon platform Tapas will terminate all operations on March 31, 2027, cutting off reader access to unlocked comic libraries and unspent digital currency, according to an updated platform FAQ published on Oct. 1.
The closure follows an announcement on Sept. 22 by parent company Kakao Entertainment confirming plans to discontinue the English-language storefront, which had left both readers and authors like TurtleMe, who serializes The Beginning After the End on the platform, shocked and unsure about their futures.
Under the schedule detailed by Tapas, both the digital storefront and previously unlocked episodes will become completely inaccessible once servers go dark on March 31, 2027.
The platform confirmed that reader purchases cannot be transferred to Kakao Page or Kakao Webtoon. Virtual currency transactions will also be non-refundable under the company’s existing service terms, meaning any unspent balances will expire alongside the platform.
Tapas halted sales of its virtual currency, Ink, and disabled all in-app methods for users to earn free currency on Oct. 1.
While readers may spend existing balances on episode unlocks through March 31, 2027, the platform stated that episode prices will remain unchanged, with no plans for clearance events or price reductions prior to the final shutdown date.
Customers may submit requests for copies of their personal account data, though the company clarified that these exports will not include saved comics and files.
The closure arrives five years after Kakao Entertainment acquired Tapas and web novel service Radish in 2021 in a transaction valued at approximately 1.1 trillion won (about USD 780 million).
The acquisition valued Tapas at roughly USD 510 million and Radish at USD 440 million before Kakao merged the subsidiaries into Tapas Entertainment in 2022. Kakao Entertainment subsequently shuttered Radish in 2025 and sold web fiction platform Wuxiaworld back to its original founder, Jingping Lai, dismantling its direct English-language digital distribution apparatus to redirect resources toward its domestic Korean services and Japanese platform Piccoma.
Originally established in 2012 by Chang Kim and Young-Jun Jang as Comic Panda before rebranding to Tapastic and later Tapas, the service accumulated more than 10 million registered users and hosted over 100,000 series from approximately 75,000 creators.
The platform hosted licensed manhwa releases such as Solo Leveling, Overgeared, and Villains Are Destined to Die, alongside other long-running and indie serializations.
Source: Tapas FAQ page
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Losing access to already unlocked episodes is the hardest part of this, since a lot of readers treated those coin purchases as a permanent library. It’s also a worrying moment for creators like TurtleMe who serialized there and now have to work out where readers will follow them.