Murder Mystery and Stranger Things 3 Top Netflix's Most Popular Releases of 2019
As 2019 comes to an end, Netflix has unveiled its list of programs that viewers binged the most this past year.
The streaming juggernaut, which reportedly has more than 158 million subscribers worldwide, announced its top 2019 programming via Twitter on Monday. Netflix ranked its top ten overall programs and also shared other lists, breaking down the programs into several categories, including most popular movies, TV shows, documentaries and standup comedies.
On the streaming service’s overall list, Murder Mystery, the comedy film starring Jennifer Aniston and Adam Sandler, ranked at the top of Netflix’s most popular releases for the year. Coming in second place was Stranger Things‘ third season which also ranked as the top TV series. Netflix had previously announced during the year that Murder Mystery and Stranger Things shattered viewership when they were initially released.
Ryan Reynolds‘ action-thriller 6 Underground came in third overall, followed by two more movies: The Incredibles 2 and The Irishman, the Martin Scorsese-directed film which has racked up many award season nominations.
Happy almost 2020! Here’s a look at the most popular series, films, and documentaries released on Netflix in the US this year. (thread) pic.twitter.com/fSHb39DbIT
— Netflix US (@netflix) December 30, 2019
Fantasy-drama series The Witcher, which stars Henry Cavill and was released this month, was sixth overall on the list and the second most popular TV series after Stranger Things. Rounding out the top ten overall was action-adventure film Triple Frontier, Zac Efron‘s Ted Bundy thriller Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile, superhero TV series The Umbrella Academy and the crime-drama film The Highwaymen.
Following Stranger Things 3, The Witcher and The Umbrella Academy as the most popular shows of the year was Christina Applegate‘s Dead to Me, season 2 of You, and award show favorites When They See Us and Unbelievable.
Sex Education, season 3 of 13 Reasons Why and Raising Dion finished off the top shows of the year. Raising Dion was also the top kids & family series of 2019.
Conversations with a Killer: The Ted Bundy Tapes was Netflix’s most popular documentary of the year and was followed by Our Planet, Fyre: The Greatest Party That Never Happened and HOMECOMING: A Film by Beyonce.
Viewers also tuned into Dave Chapelle: Sticks and Stones for Netflix’s standup comedy series, while Tidying Up with Marie Kondo took the top spot for the nonfiction releases of the year.
In October, Netflix released its viewership data from October 2018 to September 2019 to shareholders. Bird Box (which was released December 2018) easily took the No. 1 spot with 80 million views. The second most-watched was Murder Mystery, with 73 million views.
Stranger Things easily ranked as the most-watched original TV show, with 64 million views. The show also broke a Netflix record, with 40.7 million member accounts tuning in within the first four days of its third season in July.
By Netflix’s data, a single viewership qualifies as someone having watched at least 70 percent of a movie or episode.
