Fruits Basket was adapted into a twenty-six episode anime series by Studio Deen and premiered in Japan on TV Tokyo on July 5 with the final episode airing on December 27, 2001. Based on the twenty-three volume manga series Fruits Basket written by Natsuki Takaya, the series tells the story of Tohru Honda, an orphan girl living in a tent so as not to trouble anyone. After meeting Yuki, Kyo, and Shigure Sohma (who later ask her to do their housework in exchange for a room to stay in), she learns thirteen members of the Sohma family are possessed by the animals of the Chinese zodiac legend and cursed to turn into their animal forms if they embrace anyone of the opposite sex or if their bodies are under great stress. The series was directed by Akitaro Daichi. During production of the series, Daichi and Takaya ran into multiple creative differences including the cast, coloring, and storytelling direction, leading Takaya to dislike the adaptation. Funimation aired the series, in dubbed English, on their anime television channel as well as on Colours TV.

Fruits Basket was released to DVD in nine individual volumes by King Records on a monthly schedule from September 29, 2001, through May 22, 2002, with a series box set released on April 25, 2007. The series is licensed for Region 1 and Region 2 release by Funimation, which released it as four individual DVD volumes containing 6-7 episodes and as a complete series box set. As part of their release, Funimation renamed all of the episodes, which originally had simple names of "First story", "Second story", etc. On November 20, 2007, Funimation re-released the series as part of their lower priced Viridian line, with the new release containing the complete series in a thin-packed box set. The Region 2 United Kingdom releases were done through a sub-licensing agreement with Revelation Films. The series was released in Region 4 by Madman Entertainment as a series box set.

The series uses three pieces of theme music, all performed by Ritsuko Okazaki. "For Fruits Basket" (For フルーツバスケット, For Furūtsu Basuketto) is used for the opening theme for all twenty-six episodes. "Chiisana Inori" (小さな祈り, lit. Small Prayer) is used for the series ending theme, except for episode twenty-five, which uses the song "Serenade" (セレナーデ, Serenāde). In the English version, the theme songs were rewritten and redubbed with the English voice actresses Meredith McCoy performing the opening theme, Laura Bailey performing the 1st ending theme and Daphne Gere performing the 2nd ending theme.