Best Animation Studios in San Francisco (2026)

Introduction

The San Francisco Bay Area has 11 animation studios worth shortlisting in 2026, from Pixar in Emeryville and Lucasfilm Animation in the Presidio to small independents in Berkeley and Marin. Between them they cover feature films, streaming series, character work, explainers and motion design for technology launches.

It has been a busy year for the feature and series side. Pixar's Hoppers took $389.7 million worldwide after opening in March, and Toy Story 5 opened to $310.2 million globally in June, a record for the studio, although Disney's restructuring later in the year included a WARN notice covering around 108 Pixar roles. Lucasfilm Animation's Star Wars: Maul, Shadow Lord reached number one on Disney+ in April. In Berkeley, Kuku Studios' feature In Your Dreams came out on Netflix in November 2025 and picked up Annie and Critics' Choice nominations. On the brand side, most commissioned animation here is made for software and hardware companies, and Thinkmojo joined the 2026 Inc. 5000.

Every studio below has an active base in San Francisco or the wider Bay Area (Emeryville, Berkeley, Marin or the Peninsula) in 2026. Effects-led houses such as ILM are covered on our VFX page. The list runs in no fixed order of merit, since the right studio depends on the format, the style and the budget.

The best animation studios in San Francisco

1. Pixar Animation Studios

Disney · Emeryville · pixar.com

Pixar has been part of Disney since 2006 and is led by president Jim Morris and chief creative officer Pete Docter. Its films have won 23 Academy Awards. After Elio struggled at the box office in 2025, Daniel Chong's Hoppers became the highest-opening original Pixar film since Coco, and Andrew Stanton's Toy Story 5 set the studio's global opening record in June 2026.

Pixar makes its own features and Disney+ series and does not take commissioned work. It matters to anyone hiring in the Bay Area because so many local studios were founded or staffed by its alumni, including Kuku Studios and Tonko House below.

2. Lucasfilm Animation

Lucasfilm (Disney) · Presidio · lucasfilm.com

George Lucas set up Lucasfilm Animation in 2005, and it works from the Letterman Digital Arts Center alongside ILM. Dave Filoni is president and chief creative officer of the studio. Its Singapore studio closed in 2023, which leaves San Francisco as its home.

The series Star Wars: Maul, Shadow Lord, created by Filoni, premiered on Disney+ on 6 April 2026, debuted at number one on the platform worldwide and received Emmy nominations for sound editing and animation; a second season is planned for 2027. Earlier work includes The Clone Wars, The Bad Batch and Young Jedi Adventures. Like Pixar, it produces its own shows.

3. Kuku Studios

Independent · West Berkeley · kukustudios.com

Kuku Studios was founded by Alex Woo, who spent ten years at Pixar on films including Ratatouille and WALL-E, together with Stanley Moore and Tim Hahn. It works from Tenth Street in Berkeley and makes animated film and television.

Its feature In Your Dreams, directed by Woo with co-director Erik Benson and made with Netflix Animation, was released on Netflix in November 2025. It was nominated for Best Animated Feature at the Critics' Choice Awards and received two Annie nominations and a VES nomination. The studio also produces the Netflix preschool series Go! Go! Cory Carson.

4. Tonko House

Independent · Berkeley · tonkohouse.com

Former Pixar art directors Robert Kondo and Daisuke "Dice" Tsutsumi started Tonko House in Berkeley in 2014, and it also runs a studio in Japan. Its first short, The Dam Keeper, was nominated for an Academy Award, and the studio describes itself as a bridge between American and Japanese animation.

Its best-known recent production is ONI: Thunder God's Tale, released on Netflix in 2022, with Kondo as executive producer and production designer. Tonko House also publishes Dam Keeper graphic novels with First Second Books, and a Dam Keeper feature is in development. It is a good reference point for painterly, art-directed CG.

5. Baobab Studios

Independent, venture-backed · Redwood City · baobabstudios.com

Baobab Studios was founded in 2015 by Maureen Fan, Eric Darnell (director of the Madagascar films) and Larry Cutler. It made its name with VR animation such as Crow: The Legend and Baba Yaga, and its productions have won ten Emmy Awards and three Annie Awards.

The studio now develops animated franchises that connect with games. In March 2026 it acquired the Roblox games Natural Disaster Survival, Barry's Prison Run and Deepwoken for film and television development, and in August 2026 Naver Ventures announced an investment along with a first project. Series in development include Intercats and The Witchverse for Disney+.

6. iBelieveInSwordfish

Founder-led · San Rafael · ibelieveinswordfish.com

Swordfish is a motion design studio in downtown San Rafael, led by founder and chief creative officer Matt Silverman. It focuses on marketing animation and motion for user experience, and its team includes creative technologists who build generative AI workflows alongside conventional 3D and character animation.

Clients include Adobe, Apple, Microsoft, Google, Sony, Audi and Lucid Motors, where the studio worked alongside the in-house team on motion and usability. Recent projects include content for MSC Cruises' World Europa and AI-related work for Confluent, Workday and Autodesk.

7. Thinkmojo

Independent · San Francisco · thinkmojo.com

Thinkmojo is a video and motion studio founded in 2012, with offices in San Francisco and Montreal and CEO Yann Lhomme. It joined the 2026 Inc. 5000 at number 1,873 after 189% revenue growth over three years. It also runs Spectacle, a library of product and marketing videos.

Its work is almost entirely for software companies, from product explainers to launch campaigns and event content. Clients include Slack, Salesforce, Google, Zendesk, Asana, Calendly, Rubrik, Intuit and MongoDB.

8. Bonfire Labs

Independent · Jackson Square · bonfirelabs.com

Bonfire Labs works from Pacific Avenue in Jackson Square and combines strategy, live action and post-production, with 2D and 3D animation and motion design in-house. It describes itself as thinking like an agency and acting like a production company.

Motion and animation work includes projects for Adobe Firefly, Google AdSense and Salesforce. Other clients include Apple, Airbnb, PayPal and Uber, and recent films include Uber's Women Rider Preference campaign and work for Toast and Mochi Health. Bonfire Labs also appears on our San Francisco VFX list.

9. Ntropic

Founder-led · San Francisco · ntropic.com

Ntropic is a design, CG and animation studio founded by executive creative director Nathan Robinson, with offices in San Francisco, New York, Los Angeles, London and Ho Chi Minh City. Its teams cover character design, photoreal 3D and Unreal Engine work.

For animation buyers, its CG characters for Southern California Edison and its 3D work for WhatsApp are the most relevant examples. Other clients include Verizon, Amazon, Banana Boat and Naked Juice. Ntropic also appears on our San Francisco VFX list.

10. Explainly

Independent · Sausalito · explainly.com

Explainly is headquartered on Liberty Ship Way in Sausalito, with further offices in Santa Monica, New York, Chicago, Austin and London. It makes 2D, 3D and mixed-media animation along with live action, testimonial films and localised social cuts. The studio lists 14 Davey Awards, 14 Muse Awards and 17 Telly Awards.

Clients include Amazon, Google, JPMorgan, HubSpot, Uber, Visa, Toast, CLEAR and T-Mobile. It suits marketing teams that need a steady run of explainers and ad versions as well as a single hero film.

11. RogueMark Studios

Independent, women-owned · Berkeley · roguemarkstudios.com

Abby Van Muijen founded RogueMark in 2014 and the studio now works from Ashby Avenue in Berkeley. It makes explainer and educational animation, stop-motion advertising and social content, and also offers graphic recording for meetings and conferences.

Clients range from eBay and Gorilla Glue to the Walmart Foundation and MIT's Community Innovators Lab, with much of its work for nonprofits, universities and public bodies. It is a practical choice for mission-driven organisations with a complex story to explain.

What to look for in a San Francisco animation studio

Start with the format. The Bay Area's best-known studios make their own features and series and are not for hire, so most commissioned work goes to independent animation studios and to motion design shops that serve technology brands. A studio that turns around a 90-second product explainer in four weeks works very differently from one that spends years on a feature.

Look closely at style. Some studios here have a strong house look, from painterly CG to hand-drawn character work, while others adapt to each client's brand system. Ask to see work in the style you want rather than a general reel, and ask who designed it.

For tech launches, check how the studio handles unreleased product. Animation often depends on CAD files, interface builds and messaging that changes until launch day, so agree on NDAs, how assets will be shared and how late changes will be priced.

Agree the review stages before production starts. Script, storyboard, animatic, style frames and final animation each need sign-off, and changes get more expensive at every step. Studios that keep boards, renders and notes in one shared place, with a clear record of what was approved, tend to stay on schedule.

How Fabric helps animation teams

Fabric gives an animation team one workspace for scripts, boards, project files, renders and client notes, with AI search across all of it. The cloud drive streams files on demand, so heavy project files and render sequences take no local disk space and open without a full download, and shared team folders always show the latest version. There is more on this in your rendering files need a home.

Search works by meaning across documents, images, PDFs and transcribed audio and video, and colour search finds frames and style references by shade. Similar search takes a selected image and surfaces related work by composition, colour and subject, which helps when building a look from past projects. Early style exploration fits on a canvas, an infinite whiteboard that embeds Figma, YouTube and Vimeo.

A kanban board can turn a shots or deliverables folder into a pipeline view, with the files themselves as cards moving from board to animatic to final.

For client review, any folder can be published as a web page and sent with link analytics to see when each named recipient opened it. Clients can leave threaded comments through a shared link without creating an account. Highlights and comments on PDFs and documents, such as scripts and board PDFs, work today, and timestamped comments and drawing on video and images are coming soon on annotations.

Password protection and link analytics are included on Pro and Team plans. See plans for teams.

Frequently asked questions

What is the biggest animation studio in San Francisco?

Pixar Animation Studios in Emeryville, owned by Disney. Lucasfilm Animation in the Presidio is the other large studio. Both make their own films and series rather than taking commissions.

Can I hire Pixar or Lucasfilm Animation for a brand project?

No. Both studios produce their own features and series. For commissioned work, look at independents such as Kuku Studios or Tonko House for character-led storytelling, or at motion studios such as iBelieveInSwordfish, Thinkmojo and Bonfire Labs for brand and product work.

Which Bay Area studios make animation for tech product launches?

Thinkmojo, iBelieveInSwordfish, Bonfire Labs, Ntropic and Explainly all work mainly for technology brands, with clients such as Salesforce, Adobe, Google, Microsoft and Amazon.

What is the difference between an animation studio and a VFX studio?

Animation studios build the whole image, characters and worlds included. VFX studios mostly add to or alter live-action footage, often working inside another company's production. Several Bay Area studios do both. For effects-led work, see our list of the best VFX studios in San Francisco.

How much does an animated explainer cost in San Francisco?

Few studios publish rates. Cost depends on length, style, the number of characters and how many revision rounds are included, and 3D usually costs more than 2D. Ask for a scoped quote that lists each stage, from script to final delivery.

Related lists

Animation studios in other cities: New York · Los Angeles · London · Chicago · Toronto

More in San Francisco: Creative agencies · VFX · Post-production · Video production · Content studios · Design agencies

Run your studio on Fabric: Fabric for creative teams · Review and approval · Best video review software for creative teams