Hikaru no Go dramatically increased the popularity of Go in Japan and elsewhere, particularly among young children. Go professional Yukari Umezawa served as the technical advisor for the manga and promoted it on behalf of the Nihon Ki-in. She had a short one-minute special at the end of every episode instructing kids how to play Go. One of the reasons that she helped make Go so popular was because she was called "best looking Go professional". The manga also spread Go throughout the United States. As a result, many high school and middle school Go clubs were started by students influenced by the manga.

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