Elle Fanning provided the voice for the character Mei Kusakabe in the 2005 Disney English-language dub of the Studio Ghibli film My Neighbor Totoro. This role marked her entry into voice acting and was a collaboration with her sister, Dakota Fanning, who voiced the older sister Satsuki in the same film. Her work on this beloved classic by Hayao Miyazaki represents her most direct involvement in anime voice acting.

Beyond this specific anime credit, Fanning has built a broader career lending her voice to various animated projects. In 2009, she voiced the character Grace in the film Astro Boy, which is based on the popular Japanese manga and anime series of the same name. She continued her voice work in animation with the role of Winnie Portley-Rind in the 2014 stop-motion film The Boxtrolls. In 2016, she voiced the lead character, Félicie, in the animated film Ballerina, also known as Leap! in some regions. While these roles demonstrate her sustained engagement with voice acting, they are not classified as anime, with My Neighbor Totoro remaining the primary example of her work in that specific genre.