The term also refers to the format itself-a comic collection in a trade paperback sized (roughly 13 cm × 18 cm, 5 in × 7 in) book (as opposed to the larger 18 cm × 25 cm, 7 in × 10 in format used by traditional American graphic novels). Japanese speakers frequently refer to manga tankōbon by the English loanword 'comics' ( コミックス, komikkusu), although it is more widespread for being used in place of the word 'manga', as they are the same thing. In English, while a tankōbon translation is usually marketed as a ' graphic novel' or ' trade paperback', the transliterated terms tankoubon and tankōbon are sometimes used amongst online communities. Strips in manga magazines and tankobon are typically printed in black and white, but sometimes certain sections may be printed in color or using colored inks or paper. Since the 1930s, though, comic strips had been compiled into tankōbon collecting multiple installments from a single series and reprinting them in a roughly paperback-sized volume on higher quality paper than in the original magazine printing.

They are printed on cheap newsprint and are considered disposable. These anthologies often have hundreds of pages and dozens of individual series by multiple authors. Increasingly after 1959, manga came to be published in thick, phone-book-sized weekly or monthly anthology manga magazines (such as Weekly Shōnen Magazine or Weekly Shōnen Jump). This Japanese tankōbon edition of Love Hina volume 11 is smaller than this English tankōbon edition of Genshiken volume 8.

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