Stranger things are one of the most popular shows on Netflix. The story is set in the 80s following Will Byers who is a young boy living in the fictional town of Indiana called Hawkins. He goes through supernatural events that change his life forever. Here are the best episodes of stranger things.
Surely you are going to immensely enjoy Stranger Things. This is why here is a list of 25 such shows similar to Stranger Things.
25 Best shows like Stranger Things
1. Chilling Adventures of Sabrina
- Director: Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa
- Writer: Chilling Adventures of Sabrina by Archie Comics
- Cast: Kiernan Shipka, Lucy Davis, Michelle Gomez, Tati Gabrielle, Richard Coyle, Lachlan Watson, Ross Lynch, Chance Perdomo, Jaz Sinclair, Adeline Rudolph, Miranda Otto, Gavin Leatherwood
- IMDb Rating: 7.6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 84%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
The TV show is set in Greendale, which is a fictional town. The story revolves around the character Sabrina Spellman, a teenage girl who is half-witch and half-human. She is studying at Baxter high school and recently started her witch education. Being a witch and a human at the same time is not easy, and this teenager is trying to live a normal life.
2. Game of Thrones
- Director: David Benioff, D. B. Weiss
- Writer: George R.R. Martin
- Cast: Sean Bean, Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Lena Headey, Michelle Fairley, Emilia Clarke, Kit Harington, Sophie Turner, Richard Madden, Maisie Williams, Isaac Hempstead Wright, Alfie Allen, Peter Dinklage, Natalie Dormer
- IMDb Rating: 9.3/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 89%
- Streaming Platform: Disney+hotstar
One of the most popular TV shows of all time is Game of Thrones. Not only does it have a huge fanbase but an interesting story. The story is set in Westeros, which is a fictional continent where strong ancient dynasties are trying to claim the throne. As the story evolves, multiple arcs of the characters in the show are taken and proceeded further. The game of Thrones series is full of drama, action, romance, and fantasy, a complete package. All episodes will keep you on edge.
3. The Magicians
- Director: Sera Gamble, John McNamara
- Writer: The Magicians by Lev Grossman
- Cast: Jason Ralph, Olivia Taylor Dudley, Arjun Gupta, Rick Worthy, Brittany Curran, Stella Maeve, Hale Appleman, Summer Bishil, Jade Tailor, Trevor Einhorn
- IMDb Rating: 7.6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 91%
- Streaming Platform: Disney+ hotstar
The story of this series revolves around Jason Ralph in the role of Quentin Coldwater. He is a graduate student and wants to be a magician. Quentin qualifies and takes admissions into the Brakebills University for Magical Pedagogy. At the university, Quentin unfolds the magical world posing as a threat to humanity. This magical world is not the same as his favorite books from childhood.
4. The X Files
- Director: Chris Carter
- Writer: Chris Carter
- Cast: David Duchovny, Robert Patrick, Mitch Pileggi, Gillian Anderson, Annabeth Gish
- IMDb Rating: 8.6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 85%
- Streaming Platform: YouTube
The X Files is a sci-fi drama and was running successfully for 202 episodes for a total of nine seasons. The X-Files revolves around Dana Scully and Fox Mulder, who are special agents of the Federal Bureau of Investigation. They investigate cases with paranormal features, and all of them are unsolved. The duo is in conflict with each other because Scully is skeptical about the existence of aliens because she is a medical doctor, whereas Mulder believes in the existence of aliens. Scully scientifically works on the theories and discoveries of Mulder. The two agents are also involved in a huge conflict in the earlier seasons of the show. Mulder and Scully were good friends and, later on, were romantically involved.
5. The OA
- Director: Brit Marling, Zal Batmanglij
- Writer: Brit Marling, Zal Batmanglij
- Cast: Brit Marling, Scott Wilson, Alice Krige, Brendan Meyer, Ian Alexander, Sharon Van Etten, Will Brill, Kingsley Ben-Adir, Emory Cohen, Phyllis Smith, Patrick Gibson, Brandon Perea, Jason Isaacs, Paz Vega, Chloe Levine
- IMDb Rating: 7.8/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 84%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
Prairie Johnson is the main protagonist of the show. She was a missing person for seven years and suddenly came back. The OA stands for original angel, and Prairie is an adopted child who is now a young woman. After her return, Prairie can see, but she was blind seven years back and has visible scars on her back. Prairie does not tell her parents and the FBI about her whereabouts these past seven years. She, The OA, gets together a group of five local people with whom she is going to tell her entire life story.
6. Buffy The Vampire Slayer
- Director: Joss Whedon
- Writer: Joss Whedon
- Cast: Sarah Michelle Gellar, Alyson Hannigan, Anthony Stewart Head, Seth Green, Marc Blucas, Michelle Trachtenberg, Nicholas Brendon, Charisma Carpenter, David Boreanaz, James Marsters, Emma Caulfield, Amber Benson
- IMDb Rating: 8.2/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 82%
- Streaming Platform: YouTube
The inspiration for this series is from a film of the same name, which was out in 1992. Buffy The Vampire Slayer has a central character, Buffy Summers, who is chosen to fight evil forces. She is given the name Slayer and has powers that make her strong physically, accelerates the healing powers of her body, and give her endurance and intuition about things and people. Buffy also gets prophetic dreams, where she gets to know about events that are going to happen in the future.
7. Beyond Stranger Things
- Director: Matt Duffer, Ross Duffer
- Writer: Jim Rash
- Cast: Jim Rash, Ross Duffer, Shawn Levy, Matt Duffer, Gaten Matarazzo, Sean Astin
- IMDb Rating: 7.5/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 83%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
Beyond Stranger, Things is a spinoff of the hit sci-fi series Stranger Things. Stranger Things season 1 was so popular that the duffer brothers wanted to expand their universe and came up with the idea and concept of Beyond Stranger Things. Beyond Stranger Things has a total of 7 episodes, and if you are a fan of Stranger Things, you should definitely watch this spin-off.
8. Black Spot
- Director: Julien Despaux, Thierry Poiraud
- Writer: Mathieu Missoffe, Florent Meyer, Antonin Martin-Hilbert
- Cast: Suliane Brahim, Laurent Capelluto, Hubert Delattre
- IMDb Rating: 7.5/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 93%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
The Black Spot translates to White Zone in French. It is a Belgian French series revolving around the supernatural thriller. The story is set in the small town of Villefranche, which is also the hometown of the protagonist, Major Laurene Weiss. Laurene is the head of the local police which is called Gendarmerie, and the town is surrounded by mountains with a lot of land that is a forest area. The problem with this town is the huge number of murders which is way higher than the average rate.
9. Legacies
- Director: Julie Plec
- Writer: Julie Plec
- Cast: Danielle Rose Russell, Aria Shahghasemi, Jenny Boyd, Peyton Alex Smith, Chris Lee, Kaylee Bryant, Quincy Fouse, Matt Davis
- IMDb Rating: 7.5/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 94%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime Video
This fantasy drama is a spin-off of The Originals, whose inspiration was shows like The Vampire Diaries. The show follows Hope Mikaelson, who is the daughter of Hayley Marshall and Klaus Mikaelson. They are a part of some of the most powerful vampire, witch, and werewolf bloodlines in the world. Hope goes on to get an education from Salvatore school, which is for gifted children.
10. Travelers
- Director: Brad Wright
- Writer: Brad Wright
- Cast: Erc McCormack, Nesta Cooper, Reilly Dolman, MacKenzie Porter, Jared Abrahamson, Patrick Gilmore
- IMDb Rating: 8.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 96%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
This sci-fi series is set in the post-apocalypse period. To prevent the destruction of society, special operatives are given the task of preventing it. The operatives are called travelers and can time travel. They can transfer themselves to present-day individuals who are going to die soon. To transfer the soul of a traveler into a dying human being, time travel with an exact location and target is needed.
11. Shadowhunters
- Director: Ed Decter
- Writer: The Mortal Instruments by Cassandra Clare
- Cast: Katherine McNamara, Alberto Rosende, Emeraude Toubia, Harry Shum Jr., Dominic Sherwood, Matthew Daddario, Isaiah Mustafa, Alisha Wainwright
- IMDb Rating: 6.6/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 76%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
Clary Fray is the main protagonist of this series, who finds out about her reality on her 18th birthday. She is not a normal human being but comes from a legacy of shadow hunters and shows like this are not just any other teen drama. They are a hybrid of humans and angels who hunt demons and never find love.
12. Teen Wolf
- Director: Jeff Davis
- Writer: Matthew Weisman, Jeph Loeb
- Cast: Tyler Posey, Dylan O’Brien, Holland Roden, Shelley Hennig, Dylan Sprayberry, Melissa Ponzio, Crystal Reed, Tyler Hoechlin, Colton Haynes, Arden Cho, Linden Ashby, JR Bourne
- IMDb Rating: 7.7/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 81%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
A teen drama with a coming-of-age story but with a twist that describes shows like a teen wolf. The series is about Scott McCall, who is living at Beacon Hills and is a high school student. He is bitten by an alpha werewolf and becomes one himself. This is when his ordinary life is not the same anymore.
13. The Society
- Director: Christopher Keyser
- Writer: Christopher Keyser
- Cast: Kathryn Newton, Sean Berdy, Jacques Colimon, Alex Fitzalan, Jose Julian, Toby Wallace, Jack Mulhern, Gideon Adlon, Natasha Liu Bordizzo, Olivia DeJonge, Kristine Froseth, Alexander MacNicoll, Rachel Keller
- IMDb Rating: 7.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 86%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
The first season of this series shows that an entire population has mysteriously disappeared, and only a group of young kids is left. The story is set in Connecticut, where the disappearances occurred, and now there is a dense forest around the city.
14. The Mist
- Director: Christian Torpe
- Writer: The Mist by Stephen King
- Cast: Morgan Spector, Gus Birney, Okezie Morro, Darren Pettie, Frances Conroy, Alyssa Sutherland, Danica Curcic, Luke Cosgrove, Russell Posner
- IMDb Rating: 5.4/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 61%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
The story of this sci-fi series is set in a small town of Maine called Bridgeville, where a mysterious mist starts to form. There are unexpected happenings in the town, and the residents are scared because the mist is killing people.
15. Riverdale
- Director: Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa
- Writer: Archie Comics
- Cast: KJ Apa, Camila Mendes, Marisol Nichols, Ashleigh Murray, Luke Perry, Casey Cott, Charles Melton, Drew Ray Tanner, Lili Reinhart, Cole Sprouse, Madelaine Petsch, Madchen Amick, Mark Consuelos, Skeet Ulrich, Vanessa Morgan, Erinn Westbrook
- IMDb Rating: 6.9/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 86%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
Anything originating from Archie Comics is going to be a hit, and Archie Andrews is the narrator of the entire show. The story is set in the fictional town of Riverdale, which is a small place but with a whole lot of mystery and secrets within.
16. Black Mirror
- Director: Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa
- Writer: Charlie Brooker, Jesse Armstrong, Rashida Jones, William Bridges, Konnie Huq, Michael Schur
- IMDb Rating: 8.8/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 83%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
Black Mirror is one of the best science fiction shows and is in the format of an anthology series. The hit Netflix series revolves around modern societies that are skeptical about new technology with a hint of satire.
17. The Order
- Director: Dennis Heaton
- Writer: Dennis Heaton
- Cast: Jake Manley, Matt Frewer, Louriza Tronco, Sarah Grey, Max Martini
- IMDb Rating: 6.8/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 100%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
Jack Morton is the main protagonist of the show, who joins the Hermetic Order of the Blue Rose. This group is a secret society that teaches and practices magic. But there are other mysteries of this group that Jack unfolds over time.
18. Supernatural
- Director: Erc Kripke
- Writer: Eric Kripke
- Cast: Jared Padalecki, Katie Cassidy, Misha Collins, Mark Pellegrino, Jensen Ackles, Lauren Cohan, Mark A. Sheppard, Alexander Calvert
- IMDb Rating: 8.4/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 93%
- Streaming Platform: Amazon Prime Video
As the name suggests, this show follows two brothers, Sam Winchester and Dean Winchester who are out there hunting ghosts, demons, monsters, and unidentified supernatural beings from humanity.
19. October Faction
- Director: Damian Kindler
- Writer: The October Faction by Steve Niles, Damien Worm
- Cast: Tamara Taylor, Aurora Burghart, Maxim Roy, Wendy Crewson, J.C. MacKenzie, Gabriel Darku, Stephen McHattie, Megan Follows
- IMDb Rating: 6.1/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 29%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
This supernatural drama follows Deloris and Fred Allen, who are a couple hunting monsters. The couple has two twin kids and decides to go back to Fred’s hometown after his father’s death, where all the events start.
20. Wayward Pines
- Director: Eric Kripke
- Writer: The Wayward Pines novels by Blake Crouch
- Cast: Matt Dillon, Toby Jones, Reed Diamond, Charlie Tahan, Melissa Leo, Jason Patric, Josh Helman, Kacey Rohl, Djimon Hounsou, Carla Gugino, Shannyn Sossamon, Tim Griffin, Juliette Lewis, Terrence Howard, Nimrat Kaur, Tom Stevens, Hope Davis
- IMDb Rating: 7.4/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 60%
- Streaming Platform: YouTube
The story of this show is about Ethan Burke, who is investigating about two agents who have mysteriously disappeared. Ethan is an agent working for the U.S secret service.
21. Severance
- Director: Ben Stiller & Aoife McArdle
- Writer: Dan Erickson
- Cast: Adam Scott, Patricia Arquette, Tramell Tillman
- IMDb Rating: 8.7/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 97%
- Streaming Platform: Apple TV
Okay, so unlike the Upside Down, this series doesn’t have an alternate reality. But in a disturbing yet illuminating way, it does examine the concept of dividing one’s professional and personal lives.
22. Slasher
- Director: Adam MacDonald
- Writer: Aaron Martin
- Cast: Katie McGrath, Brandon Jay McLaren, Steve Byers, Dean McDermott
- IMDb Rating: 6.7/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 70%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
Nearly 30 years after her parents were killed by a serial killer in Waterbury, Sarah Bennett returns there. When she finds herself in the heart of a string of murders that are motivated by the seven deadly sins, she quickly realizes that nothing has changed. Oh, and the lead character is essentially Joyce Byers.
23. The Leftovers
- Director: Damon Lindelof & Tom Perrotta
- Writer: Damon Lindelof & Tom Perrotta
- Cast: Justin Theroux, Amy Brenneman, Christopher Eccleston, Liv Tyler
- IMDb Rating: 8.3/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 91%
- Streaming Platform: HBO Max
The people of Mapleton, New York, attempt to reclaim a new sense of “normal” after 140 million people vanish mysteriously. This one is absolutely worth binge-watching because it has just as many twists as Stranger Things and an all-star cast on top of that.
24. American Horror Story: 1984
- Director: Ryan Murphy & Brad Falchuk
- Writer: Ryan Murphy & Brad Falchuk
- Cast: Emma Roberts, Billie Lourd, Leslie Grossman, Cody Fern, John Carroll Lynch
- IMDb Rating: 7.9/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 88%
- Streaming platform: Hulu
The most current episode of the anthology series, which chronicles the tale of a group of teenagers hired as counselors at the freshly restored Camp Redwood, has made its premiere. The problem? The camp is not only notorious for a horrific massacre, but it also carries a long-standing curse that prevents visitors from dying or fleeing. The multi-dimensional plot will make you think of the movie Upside Down.
25. Sense8
- Director: Lana Wachowski & Lilly Wachowski
- Writer: Lana Wachowski & Lilly Wachowski
- Cast: Aml Ameen, Doona Bae, Jamie Clayton, Tina Desai
- IMDb Rating: 8.2/10
- Rotten Tomatoes: 86%
- Streaming Platform: Netflix
This program is a must-see as it follows a group of international characters who learn they are somehow connected. When a mystery group starts looking for them, things become hazardous, and the strangers are forced to band together in an effort to defend themselves. Like the cast of Stranger Things versus the Hawkins Laboratory, sort of.
10 Best Episodes of Stranger Things
1. The Upside Down
- Season: Season 1, Episode 8
- IMDb Rating: 9.4/10
2. The Vanishing of Will Byers
- Season: Season 1, Episode 1
- IMDb Rating: 8.6/10
3. The Gate
- Season: Season 2, Episode 9
- IMDb Rating: 9.4/10
4. The Sauna Test
- Season: Season 3, Episode 4
- IMDb Rating: 9/10
5. The Bite
- Season: Season 3, Episode 7
- IMDb Rating: 8.8/10
6. The Battle of Starcourt
- Season: Season 3, Episode 8
- IMDb Rating: 9.3/10
7. The Mind Flayer
- Season: Season 2, Episode 8
- IMDb Rating: 9.7/10
8. The Monster
- Season: Season 1, Episode 6
- IMDb Rating: 8.9/10
9. The Spy
- Season: Season 2, Episode 6
- IMDb Rating: 9.2/10
10. Trick or Treat, Freak
- Season: Season 2, Episode 2
- IMDb Rating: 8.4/10
All of the shows in this list are a treat to watch and we are sure you are going to immensely enjoy each one of them. Grab your subscriptions and start binge-watching.
