30 Best Drama Series to Stream on Netflix When You Just Can’t Pick a Show
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Netflix has thousands of options to choose from for a night of binge-watching, but finding your new favorite show can be a bit overwhelming sometimes. However, if you know you’re in the mood for some drama, we’ve rounded up some of the best titles in the genre (including the streamer’s originals and favorites from other networks) to help narrow down your selection. Below are the 30 best drama series to stream on Netflix, from Stranger Things to The Walking Dead to One Day.
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Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) is a bookstore manager who finds himself entranced by aspiring writer Guinevere Beck (Elizabeth Lail), but his attraction turns to obsession as he begins watching her through her apartment window and stalking her on social media. Based on the book by Caroline Kepnes, it doesn’t take long for Joe to take things to a bloody extreme. The cycle repeats with new victims in the second, third, and fourth seasons, all leading up to the incoming fifth and final chapter.
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Bridgerton
Based on the book series by Julia Quinn, this Regency romance follows members of the Bridgerton family as they come of age in high-society England and search for a spouse. The first season follows eldest daughter Daphne Bridgerton (Phoebe Dynevor) and her fake-turned-very real romance with the Duke of Hastings, Simon Basset (Regé-Jean Page). The second follows her brother, Anthony (Jonathan Bailey) and his steamy relationship with his fiancée’s sister, Kate Sharma (Simone Ashley). The third is set to follow the next brother, Colin (Luke Newton), and his friends-to-lovers arc with Penelope Featherington (Nicola Coughlan), who secretly pens the town gossip paper as Lady Whistledown. Netflix has also expanded the series up with Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story, a prequel that portrays the young queen and her marriage to King George.
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The Crown
The Crown is a historical drama inspired by the reign of Queen Elizabeth II, portrayed throughout the series by Claire Foy, Olivia Colman, and Imelda Staunton, who each deliver award-worthy performances. Throughout its six seasons, the show highlights key moments in royal history, from Elizabeth’s ascending the throne at 25 years old, to Winston Churchill’s death, Margaret Thatcher’s term, Prince Charles and Princess Diana’s marriage and divorce, and later, Prince William and Kate Middleton’s love story.
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Stranger Things
Set in the fictional small town of Hawkins, Indiana in the 1980s, the police are on the hunt for a 12-year-old boy named Will Byers (Noah Schnapp) after he suddenly disappears while on his way home one night. During their investigation, Will’s mother, Joyce (Winona Ryder), and his best friends Mike (Finn Wolfhard), Dustin (Gaten Matarazzo), and Lucas (Caleb McLaughlin), along with the help of police chief Jim Hopper (David Harbour), uncover a supernatural secret and darkness underneath their town.
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Beef
This award-winning comedy-drama series imagines road rage at an extreme, destructive level. Danny (Steven Yeun), a struggling contractor, and Amy (Ali Wong), a mother and successful entrepreneur, find themselves stuck in an escalating cycle of revenge that ends violently.
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3 Body Problem
3 Body Problem is a sci-fi series based on a Chinese novel of the same name by Cixin Liu. In the show, a group of scientists are on a mission to save the world from an invasion of a highly-intelligent alien species called the San-Ti. These creatures have advanced technology far superior than Earth’s, and even with the smartest, best scientists at work, time is running out. 3 Body Problem jumps between the past, present, and future, going back to the 1960s, all the way forward to 400 years from now.
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One Day
One Day is another series that was based on a book (One Day by David Nicholls), but before it was a show, it was adapted into a movie in 2011 starring Anne Hathaway and Jim Sturgess. The story follows recent University of Edinburgh class of 1988 graduates Emma and Dexter (Ambika Mod and Leo Woodall in the Netflix series), who meet by chance at a graduation ball and form a unique relationship spanning over 20 years.
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Orange Is The New Black
Inspired by the memoir Orange Is The New Black: My Year in a Women’s Prison by Piper Kerman, the show follows Piper Chapman (Taylor Schilling), a woman in her 30s with a perfectly normal life and a fiancé. That is until she gets sentenced to 15 months at a minimum-security women’s prison for the one time that she transported a suitcase full of drug money 10 years prior for her international drug mule ex-girlfriend, Alex Vause (Laura Prepon). It won’t take long for you to fall in love with the characters she meets behind bars.
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Suits
Mike Ross (Patrick J. Adams) dropped out of college and never went to law school, but he schemed his way into a law firm with a photographic memory and high LSAT scores. On the job, he works alongside attorney Harvey Specter (Gabriel Macht), who’s in on his little secret. What could go wrong? The series also stars a pre-royal Meghan Markle as paralegal Rachel Zane.
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Narcos
Narcos tells the rise and fall of Pablo Escobar, from how the Colombian drug lord got into the dangerous business to how it led to him becoming a billionaire and the leader of the infamous Medellín Cartel.
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Elite
Elite is a Spanish soap opera set in the most prestigious, exclusive high school in Spain, Las Encinas. The story focuses on three scholarship students who thought their lives were about to improve when they transferred in from their local public school. But after one of their classmates is found dead, and they are all questioned for it, they realize they aren’t as lucky as they thought.
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The Diplomat
In The Diplomat, the newly-appointed U.S. ambassador to the United Kingdom Kate Wyler (Keri Russell) must fulfill her diplomatic duties and work to avoid a war between the UK and Iran, which could, in turn, essentially cause a world war. And she must do it all while handling her struggling marriage with Hal Wyler (Rufus Sewell), an ambassador and former diplomat himself.
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Crash Landing on You
If you don’t know where to begin your K-drama journey, start here. Crash Landing on You is a romance drama released in 2019. In a paragliding accident, heiress Yoon Se-ri (Son Ye-jin) crash-lands in a forest in North Korea. Korean People’s Army captain Ri Jeong-hyeok (Hyun Bin) rescues her, and agrees to hide her and help her get back home to South Korea. But, of course, sparks fly on the way there.
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Ripley
Set in 1960s New York City, in the style of a film noir drama, swindler Tom Ripley (Andrew Scott) is hired by wealthy businessman Herbert Greenleaf (Kenneth Lonergan) to convince his son, Dickie (Johnny Flynn), to return home to New York from Italy. But his assignment sends him down a murderous path.
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Money Heist
You might have seen the handlebar-mustached masks from Money Heist before. The Spanish series shows a criminal mastermind named “The Professor” recruiting a group of eight individuals, who each go by a different city name as an alias, to carry out the biggest heists in the country’s history.
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The Queen’s Gambit
Anya Taylor-Joy plays chess prodigy Beth Harmon in this miniseries adaption of the novel by Walter Tevis. At 8 years old, Beth was sent to an orphanage after her mother tragically passed away, and she would spend her days playing the board game with the building’s custodian, Mr. Shaibel (Bill Camp). As Beth progresses in her chess career, however, she must grapple with a drug and alcohol addiction while preparing to compete against the world’s most elite players.
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The Walking Dead
Sheriff Rick Grimes (Andrew Lincoln) wakes up from a coma to find that the world has been overtaken by zombies, otherwise known as walkers. Led by Rick, a group of must survivors stick together to fight to stay alive during a zombie apocalypse. The cast includes Danai Gurira, Norman Reedus, Jeffrey Dean Morgan, and Steven Yeun.
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Shameless
Think your family is dysfunctional? Meet the Gallaghers. This 11-season comedy-drama follows alcoholic, neglectful father, Frank (William H. Macy), and Fiona (Emmy Rossum), the eldest daughter who had to step up and take the parental role for her five siblings: Phillip “Lip” (Jeremy Allen White), Ian (Cameron Monaghan), Debbie (Emma Kenney), Carl (Ethan Cutkosky), and Liam (Christian Isaiah).
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Grey’s Anatomy
With 20 seasons spanning almost 20 years, Grey’s Anatomy is a commitment, but it’s well worth the watch. Taking place in a fictional hospital in Seattle, the medical drama series follows a group of doctors who deal with love, loss, and everything in between.
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This Is Us
This Is Us is an emotional series that uses multiple timelines to tell the heartwarming story of the unconventional Pearson family: mother Rebecca (Mandy Moore), father Jack (Milo Ventimiglia), and their three children, Kevin (Justin Hartley), Kate (Chrissy Metz), and Randall (Sterling K. Brown). You’ll want to have tissues on hand.
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Ozark
Jason Bateman and Laura Linney star in this crime-drama series as Marty and Wendy Byrde, a married couple who relocate their family to the Lake of the Ozarks in Missouri, where they must protect their children whilst running a money laundering operation for a Mexican drug cartel.
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How to Get Away With Murder
Viola Davis plays a renowned defense attorney and law professor, Annalise Keating, at a university in Philadelphia, where she teaches a course on “How to Get Away With Murder.” After hand-picking a group of students to intern at her firm, the “Keating 5” put their knowledge to the test. This six-season drama is Shonda Rhimes television at its finest.
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Outlander
Based on the wildly popular book series by Diana Gabaldon, Outlander stars Caitriona Balfe as Claire Randall, a British WWII nurse who accidentally time-travels to the year 1743, where she meets Scottish warrior Jamie Fraser (Sam Heughan) and gets entangled in the Jacobite rebellion. The sweeping, decade-hopping romance will soon culminate with its incoming eighth and final season. But don’t worry, a spinoff is already in the works.
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When They See Us
Ava DuVernay directs this powerful limited series based on the true story of the 1989 Central Park Jogger case in New York City. On April 19, five Black and Latino teenagers were falsely accused and prosecuted for the sexual assault of a young white woman. When They See Us documents their 25-year legal battle, the systemic racism that the young men experienced, and how their families coped with the injustice.
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Black Mirror
Black Mirror isn’t your typical drama series. This dystopian, science-fiction anthology questions the growing role of technology in our everyday lives. You’ll never look at your phone the same way again. Miley Cyrus, Daniel Kaluuya, Jon Hamm, Michaela Coel, and Salma Hayek Pinault are just a few of the many stars who’ve appeared in the show’s six seasons.
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Squid Game
This dark K-drama became a global sensation when it premiered in 2021. 456 players from around the country, each targeted for their desperate need for cash, must compete in a series of schoolyard games taken to the extreme to win massive grand prize. The last one standing receives 45.6 billion won (about $34 million), but losing the game costs you your life. A second season is due later this year.
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Russian Doll
Nadia (Natasha Lyonne) finds herself stuck in some sort of time loop on her 36th birthday. At her party, she repeatedly dies and then respawns at the exact same time and place in the celebration. Eventually, she meets a man named Alan (Charlie Barnett) who is stuck in the same pattern, and together they must figure out what, and why, this is happening to them. Greta Lee also stars.
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Killing Eve
After getting fired from her MI5 job, Eve Polastri (Sandra Oh) joins a covert MI6 task force to find and capture the deranged but glamorous assassin Villanelle (Jodie Corner). As Eve pursues the killer on a cat-and-mouse chase, she finds herself becoming obsessed with her target—but the feeling is mutual.
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Peaky Blinders
This historical crime drama is loosely based on a true story, and takes place in Birmingham just after World War I. It centers around Thomas Shelby (Cillian Murphy) and his family, who run the most powerful gang around, the Peaky Blinders. Tommy is determined to build an empire, all while the police are trying to crack down on crime.
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MAID
Maid is inspired by Stephanie Land’s memoir, Maid: Hard Work, Low Pay, and a Mother’s Will to Survive, and shows how serious the poverty crisis in the U.S. is. The series stars Margaret Qualley as Alex, a young, single mom from Seattle who just left her abusive boyfriend. To support herself and her her 2-year-old daughter, Maddy, she gets a job as a housekeeper.
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