I watched the anime first and I really loved it, but there was no third season and so I decided to read the manga.

The story was OK, but the character progression and the ending were absolutely awful. In addition: I feel like there were too many characters involved, and when they were written as shallow two dimensional characters (no pun intended) it became confusing and tedious to have to read about them.

Yuuki is a Mary Sue. She's flat and never progresses. She was actually cooler in the first 30 chapters of the manga than in the remaining chapters.
Kaname is straight up abusive.
Zero is pathetic.


At one point in the manga there is a 1 year break, and I had high hopes that it would actually change something, but it didn't.
The ending ruined Vampire Knight for me. I initially gave it a 7 when I was around chapter 46, but I knocked it down to a 3 after I finished it.

I didn't bother to properly read the bonus chapter because I literally do not care about any of the characters anymore.

The ending is absolutely infuriating and ruined everything.

If you loved the anime, just leave it at that and don't read this manga.