American animation and japanese animation?!

The actual difference is corporate. The Japanese are better at budgeting for mid-level animations so can afford to give their animators more autonomy. The Americans are better at marshalling their forces for HUGE productions and more compromises happen in the process of making that movie. Thus Diana Wynn Jones, who just died, has had ONE adaptation of one of her books, which was very successful I thank you. I'm talking about Miyazawa's Howl's Moving Castle. She was Welsh, not American, but I still think that was a scandal.

Technically both Japanese and American animation are done at a very high level, despite the methods the studios are using to budget American Animators OUT of the process. But in terms of planning the Japanese have us beat.

first, you have know that there are a lot more then these two animation forms.

also a lot of the cartoons/anime that is shown in America are just english dubbed versions of Japanese anime.
the major difference is that american animation are mostly cartoons for little kids (there are exceptions), there for the plots are simple to understand, clieshay, and a lot of time is not spent on graphics or character development.

on the other hand japanese animation comes in different catagories ranging from one made for little boys and girls, to teenage boys and girls to adult. (note that japanese censorship is a lot less strict then amercian). because of this, a lot of japanese anime focuses on story details, character development, and graphics. they excel at this which cause most people to choose japanese anime over american cartoons (like me!!!). you will also find a lot more people of an older audience watching japanese anime rather than american cartoons now a days.

American animation tends to be much more fluid, with a seemingly higher framerate. It also seems have characters' personalities reflected in their appearances much more.

Meanwhile, Japanese animation is quite good at attention to detail in scenes. Unfortunately, this leads to many more static scenes, with as little actually moving as possible.

I think that its all up to you. I mean, personally I hate anime. I hate the drawing style, the animation style, Ive never watched an anime that I enjoyed the story line. But, my boyfriend absolutely LOVES anime. Its exactly like one person prefers bananas and another prefers apples. One is not necessarily better than the other.

Japanese ani is better

they both are very cool