About

Pompompurin, also known as Purin, Pudding Dog or Pompom, is a popular Japanese mascot developed by Sanrio, the company behind Hello Kitty. The yellow Golden Retriever character was introduced in April 1996 and has become a popular subject of fan art in artist communities such as DeviantArt and Twitter since the early 2010s. In April 2025, Pompompurin gained viral attention on TikTok after ranking in first place in the annual Sanrio ranking event.

Origin

Pompompurin was created on April 16th, 1996, through an in-house contest held by Sanrio in 1996 to design a new dog character. The character is described^[1] as a yellow Golden Retriever with a brown beret that is always on top of his head. (seen below)

On April 25th, 2024, YouTuber^[2] posted a video explaining the origin and characteristics of the Sanrio character (seen below), amassing more than 22,000 views and 681 likes in a year.

Online Presence

Throughout the 2010s and 2020s, Pompompurin has garnered a dedicated fanbase on social media, which frequently creates fan art of the character. For instance, on January 10th, 2011, DeviantArt^[3] user @Mechashinobi-X posted a Pompompurin doodle (seen below) that garnered over 2,600 views and 30 favorites in 14 years.

On June 4th, 2024, Redditor^[4] u/lilitachikawa posted a fan art of the character to the r/sanrio subreddit channel, amassing roughly 379 upvotes and 20 comments in a year.

April 2025 Sanrio Voting

On April 15th, 2025, a series of videos about Pompompurin's ranking in first place in the annual Sanrio ranking event gained viral traction. For example, TikTok^[5] user @phuodos uploaded a fan edit of the character celebrating his ranking, which received more than 1.2 million plays and 307,000 likes in a day.

On the same day, TikTok^[6] user @quinsime posted a similar video celebrating the character's current ranking in the Sanrio characters pool. The post (seen below) received more than 1.7 million plays and 322,000 likes in a day.

Various Examples

External References