The Prince of Tennis manga and anime series has a large cast of fictional characters created by Takeshi Konomi; many have appeared in the musical and film adaptations.
His bored and cocky demeanor masks his underlying affection and respect for his teammates, especially his close friend Momoshiro and team captain Tezuka.
In the musicals, Echizen has been portrayed by actors Kotaro Yanagi (2003–2006), Yuya Endo (2004–2005), Dori Sakurada (2006–2007), Shogo Sakamoto (2007–2009), Ryuki Takahashi (2008–2010), Yuki Ogoe (2010–2014), Kazuki Furuta (2015–2016), Nichika Akutsu (2016-2020) and currently Hikaru Imamaki (2020-).
In Musical: The Prince of Tennis, Tezuka has been portrayed by actors Eiji Takigawa (2003–2005), Kengo Ohkuchi, who stood as Tezuka in the place of Eiji Takigawa in the More Than Limit St. Rudolph Gakuen musical, Yu Shirota (2005–2006), Keisuke Minami (2006–2007), Daisuke Watanabe (2007–2009), Baba Ryoma (2008–2010), Takuma Wada (2010–2012), Hideya Tawada (2012–2014), Takuma Zaiki (2015–2016), Yuya Uno (2016-2018), Ryo Aoki (2018-2020), and Kento Yamada (2020-).
He and Eiji often use the "Australian Formation", where they stand directly on the center line to confuse the opponents as to which way each player will move when the ball is placed into the opposing court.
In Musical: The Prince of Tennis, Oishi has been portrayed by Yuichi Tsuchiya (2003–2005), Hiroki Suzuki (2005–2006), Yukihiro Takiguchi (2006–2007), Yuya Toyoda (2007–2009), Yuki Tsujimoto (2008–2010), Jin Hiramaki (2010–2012), Ikkei Yamamoto (2012–2014), Shun Ishida (2015–2016), Yu Matsumura (2016-2018), Takanori Ezoe (2018-2020), and Takakazu Hara (2021-).
The middle child of three, he has an older sister, Yumiko, who is very attractive and admired by his friends; his younger brother is Yuta, who was a student at Seigaku, but transferred to St. Rudolph.
A running gag in the series is that Fuji has interest in or else near-immunity to strange foods and drinks that others would find revolting to the point of fainting.
Should he ever pass out from consuming any of the strange concoctions Inui or other data tennis characters come up with, the item in question is deemed a true terror.
He is generally very relaxed and in control, often seen with a calm and content expression on his face with his eyes seemingly closed from lightly smiling, and rarely plays at full power.
Fuji recreates his tennis to be more offensive (as opposed to his more defensive, passive approach of past matches) in order to be more competitive at the U-17 world cup, at which he is one of the 14 middle schoolers representing Japan.
In Musical: The Prince of Tennis, Fuji has been portrayed by actors Kimeru (2003–2005), Takashi Nagayama, who stood in during Remarkable 1st Match Fudomine due to a cast change, Hiroki Aiba (2005–2007, 2008), Yūta Furukawa (2007–2009), Taito Hashimoto (2008–2010), Ryo Mitsuya (2010–2012), Yusuke Yata (2012–2014), Yuki Kamisato (2015–2016), Fuma Sadamoto (2016-2018), Ibu Minaki (2018-2020), and Haruki Mochida (2021-).
This, combined with his almost robotic analytical nature the fact that his eyes are rarely seen (appearing only once at the end of Chapter 211), creating no shortage of awkwardness in social situations outside the court.
In the musicals, Inui has been portrayed by Sota Aoyama (2003–2005), Hirofumi Araki (2005–2006), Masei Nakayama (2006–2007), Yuuta Takahashi (2007–2009), Yusuke Arai (2008–2010), Teruma (2010–2012), Seiya Inagaki (2012–2014), and Ryosei Tanaka (2015–2016), Sho Kato (2016-2018), Daisuke Takenouchi (2018-2020), and Ichigo Shiota (2021-).
Eiji's favorite color is red; he enjoys brushing his teeth, wandering around pet shops, omelette rice, fried shrimp, and shaved ice.
In the musicals, Eiji has been portrayed by Yamazaki Ichitaro (2003–2004), Takashi Nagayama (2003–2005), Adachi Osamu (2005–2006), Koji Seto (2006–2007), Kyousuke Hamao (2007–2009), Takasaki Shouta (2008–2010), Koseki Yuta (2010–2012), Mario Kuroba (2012–2014), and Honda Reo (2015–2016), Seiichiro Nagata (2016-2018), Tsukasa Taguchi (2018-2020), and Sosho Tomimoto (2021-).
Momoshiro is the closest to a true friend Ryoma Echizen can claim; the two spend much time together eating hamburgers or playing street tennis.
When Oishi injures his wrist before the match against Hyotei, Momoshiro takes his place to form a makeshift Golden Pair with Kikumaru.
He later improves upon this ability by training in the mountains, allowing him to be more in tune with nature to the point where he can even read and predict weather patterns.
In the musicals, Momoshiro has been portrayed by Eiji Moriyama (2003–2005), Masaki Kaji (2005–2006), Shinpei Takagi (2006–2007), Tetsuya Makita (2007–2009), Toshihiro Nobuyama (2008–2010), Toru Kamitsuru (2010–2012), Mashu Ishiwatari (2012–2014), Shuto Mashima (2015–2016), Shunsaku Yoshimura (2016-2018), Tatsuki Ōkubo (2018-2020), and Shun Hojuyama (2020-).
Voiced by: Naru Kawamoto (Japanese); Richard Cansino (Viz Media dub), Anthony Sardinha (Funimation dub) (English) Takashi Kawamura (河村 隆, Kawamura Takashi) has a shy personality without his tennis racket, but he becomes extremely aggressive and loud once he holds a tennis racket, referred to as Burning Mode.
He plans to quit playing tennis after the tournament and focus on working as a sushi chef under his father with the goal of being number one in the future.
In the musicals, Kawamura has been portrayed by Yoshitsugu Abe (2003–2005), Eiki Kitamura, who stood in for Abe in the More than St. Rudolph Gakuen Musical, Yoshikazu Kotani (2005–2006), Kouji Watanabe (2006–2007), Hiroaki Ogasawara (2007–2009, eventually replaced by Gong Teyu), Ikkou Chou (2008–2010), Sora Yaguchi (previously known as Tomohiro Tsurumi) (2010–2012), Shohei (2012–2014), Kodai Takikawa (2015–2016), Masaya Suzuki (2016-2018), Tomoki Iwata (2018-2020), and Kai Otomo (2021-).
Voiced by: Kōhei Kiyasu (Japanese); David Lodge (Viz Media dub), Jarrod Greene (Funimation dub) (English) Kaoru Kaido (海堂 薫, Kaidō Kaoru) (sometimes spelled Kaidou) is known as "Viper" to his teammates for constantly making a "fshuuuu" sound similar to a snake while exhaling.
In the musicals, Kaido has been portrayed by Naoya Gomoto (2003–2005), Kousuke Kujirai (2005–2006), Tomo Yanagishita (2006–2008), Yuuichirou Hirata (2007–2009), Akihiro Hayashi (2008–2010), Ryosuke Ikeoka (2010–2012), Tatsunari Kimura [ja] (2012–2014), Hiroki Sana (2015–2016), Hikaru Makishima (2016-2018), Takuto Nakajima (2018-2020), and Yuga Iwasaki (2021-).
She has a good relationship with her regulars and participates in their recreational group activities: the bowling reunion and the beach-volley mini-tournament with Rokkaku Middle School.
Tachibana and the abused freshman attempted to rally together and form their own tennis club, but the coach and the other players find this idea absurd and try to stop this from happening.
Tachibana and the others eventually reform the club, and in the series, upsets Kakinoki in the District Tournament semi-finals and Hyotei in the Prefectural quarterfinals.
St. Rudolph Academy (私立聖ルドルフ学院中学校, Shiritsu Sei RUDORUFU Gakuin Chūgakkō) is a team that first appears in the Tokyo Metropolitan Matches arc and faces Seigaku in the quarterfinals.
When their strategy was foiled in the previous year by Seigaku's Tezuka defeating Sengoku, they recruited a second dominant singles player Jin Akutsu, with the aim to eliminate that weakness.