The isekai genre is still going strong, and more and more manga artists and light novel authors are experimenting with the boundaries of the isekai concept to make something new, either in terms of the world the main character visits or the main character themselves. Some isekai heroes rely on luck to survive, such as Kazuma Sato, or cheat-level strength. Others use their sheer wits.
An isekai adventure may be a lot more fun if the main character is smart, able to formulate effective strategies for battle or forming a guild or a nation in which to live. Some of these isekai heroes actually have a background in higher education, or are self-taught in an advanced field, and it always pays off. Some are simply too smart for goblins or demon kings to handle.
10 Azusa Aizawa Can Develop New Spells & Run A Tight Household (I've Been Killing Slimes For 300 Years And Maxed Out My Level)
Azusa Aizawa, the witch of the highlands in I've Been Killing Slimes for 300 Years and Maxed Out My Level, may not be a genius like some other isekai heroes are, but she has plenty of everyday smarts and a responsible attitude to match, making her an isekai protagonist who defines herself by her good decision-making rather than her powerful magic. She has humble, everyday intelligence that makes her an effective isekai heroine.
Azusa can formulate brand-new magical spells, complete with their runes, with a combination of her arcane knowledge and sheer creativity, and this has saved the day more than once. She is also more than capable of adopting two foster daughters and juggling an active social life, and she has plenty of worldly wisdom to share, too.
9 Naofumi Iwatani Is Practical & Thinks Ahead (The Rising Of The Shield Hero)
Like Azusa, the shield hero Naofumi Iwatani has everyday smarts that allow him to succeed and thrive in a brand-new world. He may not be a scientist or master politician, but he puts a lot of thought into everything he does, and he alone accomplished more good than the other three Cardinal Heroes did.
Naofumi always considers both the positive and negative consequences of his actions, and he's crafty enough to do favors for townsfolk and get monetary rewards for his work. He is also rather sharp in battle, using his shields in creative and resourceful ways to back up Raphtalia and Filo.
8 Rimuru Tempest Is Becoming A Fantasy Politician & Master Of Statecraft (That Time I Got Reincarnated As A Slime)
A Japanese salaryman found himself reincarnated as a blue slime critter, and although he is positively loaded with magical spells and strength, he is a constructive and selfless hero who would rather use his talents (and brains) to build a brand-new kingdom out of scratch. And so far, it's working.
It takes some serious work to bring together disparate fantasy races and form a fully functioning and peaceful nation, but Rimuru did it, and he is also learning the ropes of international diplomacy and politics. He's learning it as he goes, but he's up to the challenge. Statecraft can be more exciting than any dungeon crawl.
7 Ainz Ooal Gown Is A Crafty Antihero Schemer (Overlord)
The skull-headed isekai hero known as Ainz Ooal Gown was initially a player in a huge MMO, but when the game was supposed to shut down, it kept going, and the player ended up actually becoming his character. He's stuck here, so he might as well become the overlord of the entire world.
Ainz is walking a tightrope as a villainous hero, and he has the brains to handle it. He is always plotting something, carefully manipulating the people, armies and nations around him to reshape the world according to his desires. That requires some serious mental juggling to pull off, and he can't afford to slip up even once.
6 Myne Can Gather & Build Everything She Needs To Make Books (Ascendance Of A Bookworm)
Myne ranks among the youngest isekai heroes of all, and she is also one of the least physically adept of them. She is not only a small child, but one plagued with an affliction that often leaves her bedridden in Ascendance of a Bookworm. But her problems have done nothing to dull her razor-sharp mind.
In her previous life, Myne loved books more than anything, and now, she will gather resources, craft things with her own hands, and even work with businessmen to open her own printing business and make books. That's impressive, especially given the modest, working-class family into which she was reborn. Her new parents have never held a book in their lives.
5 Kazuya Souma Is Uniting Everyone In His Kingdom (How A Realist Hero Rebuilt The Kingdom)
Kazuya Souma is a sharp military strategist and statesman, and the world into which he was reborn certainly needed a hero such as him. He became the ruler of the Elfrieden kingdom, and as the show's title, How A Realist Hero Rebuilt the Kingdom, suggests, he set about improving the standard of living of all his subjects. But he's not done yet.
Kazuya soon fought a civil war with Duke Georg Carmine and Duke Castor Vargas, not to mention another nation, the Principality of Amidonia. Kazuya defeated all these foes in a week, and he did it with remarkable military strategies that kept his enemies guessing. He ought to play a few RTS games to help keep his skills sharp.
4 Shiroe Founded A Guild & Crafts Cunning Strategies (Log Horizon)
In real life, this isekai protagonist was a young man named Kei Shirogane, an engineering graduate student who played the Elder Tale game for about eight years or so before ending up inside the game for real. He was already well-known as a strategist gamer, and living in the world simply gave him another chance to show off his brainpower.
Now Shiroe is the founder and boss of the Log Horizon guild, and sure enough, his arcane skills and his crafty strategies are more than sufficient to get him ahead in the game, proving that powerful magic alone doesn't make for a compelling isekai lead. A brilliant mind rounds out the package nicely.
3 Shiro & Sora Are An Elite Gaming Tag Team (No Game No Life)
No Game No Life's step-brother/step-sister team is effectively one person, since Sora and his little sister Shiro always play strategy games online as a singular entity, calling itself Blank. Never once has Blank lost a game, so now it's time for a fresh challenge: to end up in a world where games have replaced war.
Sora and Shiro sometimes play alone, but whenever they can, they play together as Blank, and no matter the game, no one can defeat them or outwit them. To them, chess might as well be Tic-Tac-Toe.
2 Ringo Ohoshi Is A Brilliant Engineer (High School Prodigies Have It Easy Even In Another World)
In High School Prodigies Have It Easy Even In Another World, an entire team of brilliant adolescents find themselves in a fantasy world, and Ringo Ohoshi is arguably the most gifted of them. Ringo is a quiet young woman who is unmatched in the field of engineering and machinery, and she puts these skills to good use.
Ringo single-handedly launched an industrial revolution in the isekai world, pushing the natives decades or even centuries ahead in the world of engineering. In fact, some of Ringo's contraptions and inventions are ahead of what can be found in the real world.
1 Senku Ishigami Is The Scientist Who Will Save The World (Dr. Stone)
There is no doubt that Ringo is among the smartest isekai heroes of all time, but Dr. Stone's Senku Ishigami is even more brilliant, mainly because his expertise is broader than Ringo's. Senku has spent years hungrily learning everything he can about every field of science, from biology and geology to engineering, chemistry, electromagnetism, astronomy and more.
Senku knows something about everything, and he has re-invented countless machines, medicines and more in the new stone age. He has made lightbulbs, flash grenades, walkie-talkies, combustion engines, working gas masks and more, and that's just in the anime; in the manga, his future projects are even more ambitious and ingenious - and all this without the benefit of modern infrastructure and workshops.