nanoblock is a type of building block similar to the well-known LEGO coming out of Japan. A lot of the shapes of the bricks are similar to LEGO. However, nanoblock is much smaller than LEGO. The smallest 1×1 nanoblock is 4mm x 4mm x 5mm. Below is a comparison of a quarter to a LEGO and a nanoblock of the same size.
nanoblock kits come with enough blocks to complete the build, along with at least 1 extra of each brick in the kit. The only bricks that don’t get duplicates are the custom-printed bricks. Each kit also comes with instructions that are printed in color and English. In general, even older kits that were only available in Japan have English directions. Some of the Tokyo Disneyland kits are black and white and only have Japanese directions, mostly using Katakana for color names.
The thing that makes nanoblock unique is how much variety is there in the kits. nanoblock gets licenses to do a lot of characters from various anime. These kits include Pokemon, Demon Slayer, Sanrio, and Doraemon. They are also sold at Tokyo Disneyland and Universal Studios Japan. nanoblock also has a collection of buildings and cultural objects from around the world. The nanoblock Mini Collection contains all kinds of topics, including animals, Christmas decorations, food, and musical instruments. There is also a collection of deluxe builds, which are several times larger than smaller builds. The deluxe builds are generally famous sights from around the world, such as Himeiji Castle or the Eiffel Tower.
My favorite part of nanoblock is how few stickers are used compared to LEGO. Most of the kits don’t come with stickers. The few kits I have seen stickers are to create details like kanji or faces when the details are too small to be created in bricks. In general, small details like the eyes and noses of people or Pokemon are created using bricks instead of using stickers. nanoblock has been making more custom-printed bricks to have details instead of using stickers.
nanoblock is released by the Japanese company Kawada. Almost all the kits have been released in Japan, with a few being regionally released in Australia and convention sets in the US. Since nanoblock isn’t well known in the US, few kits are available in the US. The main kits available are the Pokemon kits. I generally import all my kits from Japan via proxies or sites like Plaza Japan. I do pay more money for shipping, but I do get the kits close to the release dates in Japan instead of needing to wait for the kits to be released in the US.
In general, it is only possible to get nanoblock bricks in the various building kits. Variety and mixed kits of just bricks are not really available in the US. You can buy packets of single bricks from physical nanoblock stores in Japan or from the diablock store on the Japanese Rakuten, but only certain types of bricks are available.
