Cherry Arai is a Japanese manga artist and doujin writer, recognized as the creator behind series such as Engaged to the Unidentified and Three Leaves, Three Colors. She is a female artist from Fukushima Prefecture.

Arai began her career using the pen name Tsushima Ryo, contributing to game-based anthology comics published by Studio DNA, a predecessor of Ichijinsha. She adopted the name Cherry Arai in January 2003, making her original debut with the four-panel manga Three Leaves, Three Colors, which began serialization in Houbunsha’s Manga Time Kirara magazine. Following this, she became an active figure in the late 2000s moe four-panel manga boom, working primarily with Houbunsha and Ichijinsha. During 2007 and 2008, she concurrently ran different series across four magazines in Houbunsha’s Manga Time Kirara lineup, including the story-focused Manga Time Kirara Forward.

Alongside her commercial work, Arai participates in doujin circles, publishing original works under her personal circle C and the collaborative circle Zundamochi Shimai with fellow artist Chiki Nonohara. In her home prefecture of Fukushima, she has contributed illustrations for the regional promotion project Moe no Sakura, which features the historical figure Yamamoto Yaeko, and for the sake brand Moe Shu by the Hanaharu Sake Brewery. Following the 2011 Tōhoku earthquake and the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster, she temporarily evacuated and placed all ongoing serializations on hold, resuming work in July of that year.

Arai’s body of work consists primarily of four-panel manga. Her notable completed serializations include Wonderful Days, which ran in Manga Time Kirara MAX from 2004 to 2012, and Seinaru Megumi, published in Manga Time Kirara Carat from 2009 to 2011. Three Leaves, Three Colors concluded in January 2019 after a serialization that spanned over fifteen years, resulting in fourteen compiled volumes. Her series Ichigo no Haitta Sōda Mizu ran in Manga Time Kirara MAX from 2012 to 2018, and Musunde, Tsunaide. was serialized in Manga Time Kirara from 2019 to 2022.

Her best-known work, Engaged to the Unidentified, began serialization in Ichijinsha’s Manga 4-Koma Palette in 2009. The magazine ceased publication in 2022, after which the series was transferred to Monthly Comic Rex, where it concluded in March 2024. The manga was compiled into sixteen volumes. The series received an anime television adaptation produced by Doga Kobo, which aired for twelve episodes from January to March 2014, accompanied by two original video animation episodes. Arai is credited as the original creator and original character designer for the anime adaptation. Her first serialized work, Three Leaves, Three Colors, was also adapted into an anime by Doga Kobo, airing from April to June 2016.

A distinct element of Arai’s creative style is her use of interconnected settings across different works. She frequently employs a "hyperlink" technique where separate series share the same fictional location, and characters or establishments introduced in one series will make appearances in another. Her contributions to the industry extend beyond her own serializations; she has provided illustration work for other projects, including ending illustrations for various anime episodes and character designs for the game Kirara Fantasia. Her career marks her as a significant contributor to the four-panel manga genre, with her series Three Leaves, Three Colors noted for being the only work in Houbunsha’s Manga Time Kirara lineup to receive an anime adaptation after a serialization period exceeding ten years.