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What the latest studies found
The strongest recent evidence comes from two studies that measure different parts of animation. Berkeley examined theatrical films and calculated screen-time shares; the Geena Davis Institute counted character representation in new children’s programming. Their samples cannot be pooled into one percentage, but they point in the same direction: nonhuman characters are more male-coded than human characters.
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| Study and sample | Measure | Finding |
|---|---|---|
| UC Berkeley, 2026; 224 popular animated films selected from yearly box-office top-50 lists, 1937–2025, with detailed analysis focused on 1980 onward | Share of total film screen time | Female nonhuman characters received about 25% of screen time |
| Geena Davis Institute report, 2026; new children’s programming released in 2025 | Share of animated characters | 64.7% male and 35.3% female among nonhuman characters |
| Geena Davis Institute report, same programming sample | Human versus nonhuman comparison | Animated human characters were 53.1% male and 46.9% female; nonhuman characters made up 51.7% of all characters |
The institute also reports that 35.4% of nonhuman characters were female in one of its tabulations. The one-decimal difference from 35.3% reflects reporting or rounding context, not a different overall conclusion.
Why the disparity is concentrated in animals and creatures
Animation is not one uniform category. Human girls and women have gained visibility, while animal, creature and machine characters often remain defaulted to male. In Berkeley’s abstract, the researchers say overall female representation in animated films broadly tracks live-action films from 1980–2025, but the split between character types is stark: human characters have much greater representation among women and girls, while nonhumans are largely male.
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This matters because nonhuman characters are not marginal decoration. They can be protagonists, narrators, comic leads, members of a hero group, or the title character. If the creature population is mostly male, the film’s apparent diversity can overstate how much speaking time, agency and story importance female characters receive.
How the Berkeley film study classified characters
The Berkeley team selected 224 films that ranked among the top 50 movies at the box office in each year from 1937 through 2025. The researchers used computational models to identify characters and estimate how long each appeared on screen, then manually checked the model’s work in 100 films.
Gender coding is more complicated for an animated animal or fantasy being than for a human performer. The researchers inferred gender from the voice actor, pronouns, fan-community descriptions and manual review when those signals conflicted. Animated characters do not self-identify, so these labels are interpretive classifications rather than self-reported identities.
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The result is a screen-time measure, not simply a head count. A film can have several female creatures who appear briefly and one male creature who dominates the plot; a count of characters and a count of minutes will produce different impressions. Berkeley’s approximately 25% figure refers to total screen time allocated to female nonhuman characters in its corpus.
Individual films show the pattern is not universal
Population-level averages conceal large differences between franchises and releases. Berkeley’s examples include:
- Frozen: female nonhuman characters received about 13% of total screen time.
- Frozen II: the share fell to about 1%.
- Moana and its sequel: the analysis found no screen time for female nonhuman characters.
- Raya and the Last Dragon: female nonhuman characters received nearly 79% of nonhuman screen time.
- Inside Out 2: female nonhuman characters received about 78% of nonhuman screen time.
These exceptions are important. They show that a male default is a recurring industry pattern, not a rule that every animated movie follows. Comparing one film with another is most informative when you specify whether you mean human or nonhuman characters, cast share or screen-time share, and lead, speaking, title or auxiliary roles.
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What earlier research says about the historical trend
Sara C. Hare’s 2017 study examined 150 top-grossing full-length animated films released from 1980 through 2016. Male characters held an overwhelming majority of lead or protagonist, speaking, protagonist-gang and title roles. Hare found no significant change in the overall gender balance during that period. The study did find that films with more female authors and screenwriters tended to include more female characters in those roles.
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Hare’s findings provide historical context for the newer Berkeley result. The persistence of a male majority is not confined to a single recent release cycle, although the studies use different samples and measures.
Children’s television shows a similar nonhuman split
The Geena Davis Institute’s report on programming released in 2025 broadens the picture beyond theatrical films. In its animated-character data, 64.7% of nonhuman characters were male and 35.3% female. Animated human characters were much closer to balance at 53.1% male and 46.9% female. Nonhuman characters represented 51.7% of all characters in the new-programming sample, so this is a large part of what children see rather than a tiny niche.
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The institute recommends that writers and character designers make gender an active decision when creating animal and creature characters, beginning with leads instead of automatically making them male. That recommendation addresses the design choice revealed by the statistics; it does not claim that every character must be assigned a binary gender.
Independent reader supportYour contribution helps us test, update, and keep practical guides available for everyone.What these numbers do—and do not—prove
They do show a persistent representation gap
Across a large box-office-selected film corpus and a separate children’s-programming sample, female nonhuman characters receive less representation than male nonhuman characters. The gap is especially clear when screen time, lead roles and speaking roles are considered together.
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Neither the Berkeley study nor the Geena Davis Institute report establishes that this imbalance causes a particular psychological, educational or behavioral outcome. They describe what appears on screen. Claims about children’s responses require separate developmental or media-effects research.
They are not a census of every animated production
Berkeley’s films were selected through yearly box-office top-50 lists, which favors commercially visible releases and does not represent every short, independent, international or lower-grossing film. The television report covers a different medium, year and denominator. Treat both as evidence of a broad pattern, not as a single universal rate.
How to evaluate gender balance in an animated film
- Separate humans from nonhumans. A near-balanced human cast can coexist with a heavily male creature cast.
- Check screen time as well as head count. Count who appears, then ask who receives sustained minutes and dialogue.
- Identify role importance. Lead, title, protagonist-group, speaking and auxiliary roles reveal different kinds of access to the story.
- Record the release period and franchise. A single sequel or era may not reflect the medium as a whole.
- Ask how gender was assigned. Voice, pronouns and character descriptions can conflict, especially for creatures without explicit identities.
The practical conclusion for viewers is straightforward: do not infer parity from the number of named characters alone. For creators, the data identify a concrete decision point—whether an animal or creature lead is automatically written as male, or whether gender distribution is considered deliberately.
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