Webcomic App Review - Lezhin Comics
The first of the Manhwa apps I tried out. What did I think of it?
So I’ve actually mentioned this app in a past post. You can read it right here. I briefly explained how I discovered this particular app. If you’re new to this Substack (hi!), check out that past post. With that said, here’s some more info about this app and what I over all thought of it.
Unlike the previous app/site, this one features manhwa rather than manga. In fact all the other apps will be manhwa and not manga. Incidentally aside from eBook stores like Comixology/Amazon Prime, let me know if you have a good place to get manga from!
What is Lezhin Comics?
This is an app (and website) that has manhwa available as webcomics. Like many of the other apps I’ll be reviewing after this, you can’t access NC17/Adult comics directly. You would need to log into the website and access it that way first. Then you will be able to read it on the app. This is loophole given that due to rules on Apple App store and Google Play store.
Lezhin Comics is “a premium webtoon platform operated by Lezhin Entertainment, a global content company” on the website. It’s pretty fascinating what other companies are listed as affiliates. I’m not a business news reporter so I’m not going to dig too much into this.
Lezhin was started in 2013 by a Korean blogger named Han Hee-Sung, who later became the CEO. Two years later, Lezhin became available in English and Japanese. Again as you’ll see with some of the apps I’m reviewing in this little series I’m working on, comic artists can actually submit their work to be distributed on Lezhin. The link above does include instructions on how to send your work to them.
There were apparently some controversies in the early years of Lezhin’s founding. However these sources are Korean articles, which I can’t read. Also again these were from more than five years ago. So presumably these issues got resolved. Especially since Lezhin was purchased in 2021 by Kidari Studios.
Cost
The first three chapters of the manhwa are free. It gives you a chance to decide whether you are into this story or not. Lezhin uses “coins” as their internal currency system. They also have points, which can be exchanged (with of course a fee) for coins. I’ve exchanged 400 points and $2.99 to get 120 coins and 40 bonus coins. This would basically mean I got the 40 coins/$1 and 10 points = 1 bonus coin.
The manhwa vary in cost per chapter. They generally range from 20 to 30 coins per chapter. You have the option of purchasing one chapter at a time or you can buy all the available chapters in one shot.
Coins can be purchased with coin bundles, VIP monthly coins, special sales, or VIP bonus sales. When you purchase coins you typically receive bonus coins. You can also earn points from purchasing the coin bundles or when you purchase all the chapters of a series you’re reading.
If you’re purchasing coin bundles, they’re about 40 coins/$1 and varying amount of bonus coins. The cheapest is US$5.99 for 240 coins and a bonus 20 coins (43 coins/$1). The most expensive is $49.99 for 2000 coins and 500 coins (50 coins/$1).
The VIP status is you get charged $14.99/month and receive 1,200 coins in return. This basically means you’re getting 80 coins/$1 instead of the regular 40 coins/$1 rate. Also you get access to additional coin bundles in case 1,200 coins per month wasn’t enough. (This might be true if you’re binge reading multiple titles or you’re reading a long series!) As I’m writing this, here is the current special VIP bundles available right now.
If you do the math that means it costs you $1 to read 1-2 chapters. Or if you want to compare to Coolmic (read the review here), at $5 would be 200 coins. That would mean you can read 6-10 chapters depending on the series. Coolmic ranges from 6-8 chapters for the same price. So it’s pretty similar price point unless you’re reading a manhwa that happens to be 20 coins a chapter.
There are periodic coin bundle sales happening. As these can vary in price point, I won’t discuss how much those are.
My personal thoughts
Content wise you can get a pretty good variety of content in terms of subject matter. They advertise BL/GL stories so if you’re into LGBTQ content that’s available to you. As I said earlier you can read “adult” content on there, but there’s plenty of stories that are less spicy in nature.
Also price wise it’s not bad at all. I mean when you compare to printed manhwa/manga, these are a real bargain. Granted the cost of print, storage, etc. is a part of the price point for print. But still you’re ultimately getting more content for what you’re paying for.
I have to confess it’s been at least a couple months since I’ve read stories on this app. Three of the other four apps have been dividing my attention lately. I think in the near future I’ll switch back to this app again given how many coins and points that will go to waste if I don’t use them up! Incidentally there’s a couple stories I have completely read on Lezhin that will definitely be reviews I do on the podcast in the near future. So stay tuned!
If you’ve tried any of these, which ones? What did you think of them? If you haven’t used any, which one would you try?