For millions of subscribers, Netflix is more than just a movie hub: It’s a place to get lost on a weeknight or weekend binging your favorite TV show. If you’ve already consumed perennial favorites like Seinfeld, Breaking Bad, and The Crown, check out these other shows worth your downtime.
- The Gentlemen
- Ripley
- Sex and the City
- Friday Night Lights
- Grey’s Anatomy
- Lovesick
- Jane the Virgin
- Crashing
- Gilmore Girls
- Money Heist
- Sex Education
- Suits
- Band of Brothers
- How to Get Away With Murder
A spin-off of the 2019 action-comedy starring Matthew McConaughey, the series version of The Gentlemen offers Guy Ritchie’s signature frenetic strangeness room to breathe over the course of eight episodes. Theo James stars as the second son of a dead Duke who inherits everything: a worthless title, a crumbling old mansion, and a failing business buoyed by cannabis growers who pay big for rent. Things come to a head when the new landlord wants them gone.
Ripley
Andrew Scott brings his Moriarty vibes to fellow iconic sociopath Tom Ripley. The small-time grifter falls in love with the carefree trust fund lifestyle enough that he’s willing to kill for it, change his identity, and run from the cops—all while ordering another Negroni. Based on Patricia Highsmith’s blood-pressure-spiking novels and directed by Oscar winner Steven Zaillian (Schindler’s List), the series is shot in breathtaking black-and-white courtesy of yet another Oscar winner—cinematographer Robert Elswit (There Will Be Blood).
More than 25 years since its debut, Netflix finally has the first six seasons of the phenomenon that swirled sex, romance, comedy, and drama together with cranberry juice and vodka for a smooth finish. Sex columnist Carrie Bradshaw (Sarah Jessica Parker) leans on her friends for help navigating matters of the heart and the bedroom. And just like that, you can binge through all the emotions of modern love.
Friday Night Lights
The drama of small-town Texas high school football is captured in this series starring Kyle Chandler and Connie Britton. It was the second time NBC tried adapting author Buzz Bissinger’s book, which also inspired a 2004 movie starring Billy Bob Thornton: When the network couldn’t get the rights, they aired a 1993 take-off, Against the Grain, with a young Ben Affleck as the quarterback.
Ellen Pompeo leads a sprawling cast in one of the most popular primetime medical dramas in television history. As Meredith Grey, Pompeo navigates hospital politics and personal upheaval. All 19 seasons are currently streaming.
Lovesick
You might have passed this show by when it came out under its original name, Scrotal Recall. But let us tell you something: Lovesick is an antidote to what ails you. It all starts when Dylan (Johnny Flynn) has to let his former lovers know that he has a sexually transmitted disease. What comes next is a dressing down of each of those relationships, one by one, and their absolute worst moments. Rounding out the cast are his two friends Evie (Antonia Thomas) and Luke (Daniel Ings). Lovesick is a heartfelt romp into relationship dysfunction and the things we do for love and intimate connection.
Gina Rodriguez stars in this winning CW comedy about a young woman forced to reconsider her future when she becomes pregnant after being mistakenly artificially inseminated.
Crashing
A pre-Fleabag Phoebe Waller-Bridge created and co-stars in this ensemble comedy about a group of disenfranchised twentysomethings who become live-in guards for an abandoned hospital and find themselves getting a little too close for comfort. It’s perfect for when you need a single-season, six-episode mini-binge.
Lauren Graham and Alexis Bledel star in this mother-daughter dramedy that never fails to win audiences over. Aside from work as an extra in 1998’s Rushmore, NYU student Bledel had no acting experience before being cast as Rory Gilmore.
Money Heist
This Spanish-language drama has gotten raves for its suspenseful and original take on the heist genre. Instead of swiping cash, this group of thieves breaks into the Royal Mint of Spain to print it themselves. The show is among the most popular non-English titles on the service worldwide.
If you haven’t started digging into Sex Education, what are you waiting for? The delightful coming-of-age series is funny, idealized, and in some ways totally retro—and features Gillian Anderson as a sensualist sex therapist mom to boot. Asa Butterfield stars as her son, Otis, an awkward teen grappling with his mom’s work and the skills he inherits from living with her, who then teams up with schoolmate Maeve (Emma Mackey) to help better the sex lives of his fellow students. (For money, of course.) The ensemble series that unfolds is equal parts earnest, hilarious, raunchy, and distinctly both British and American in its sensibilities, creating a fun universe in which to live.
Key & Peele
Keegan-Michael Key and Jordan Peele headline this popular sketch comedy series. The two originally auditioned for the same open spot on MADtv.
Gabriel Macht and Patrick J. Adams star as lawyers, with most clients of their firm not aware that Adams is a college dropout. Though the show—which co-stars Meghan Markle—was a modest hit on USA, it has since become a powerhouse for Netflix, earning over 1 billion minutes of watch time.
Band of Brothers
Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks produced this celebrated limited series about Easy Company, a tight-knit crew of soldiers hoping to survive World War II. The massive budget for the 10-episode show—a reported $125 million—made it among the most expensive small-screen productions of all time.
Viola Davis stars as a law professor who engages her students to help solve a murder. Naturally, not everything is as it seems. Davis was nominated for four Emmys and won in 2015 for her performance.
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A version of this story ran in 2020; it has been updated for 2024.
