Stranger Things was far and away the most watched original series on any streaming platform in 2025. It was so big, in fact, that just the five weeks at the end of the year when its final season debuted led all others.
What Stranger Things was not, though, was No. 1 overall for the year in streaming. That title once again belongs to Bluey, the beloved kids show that racked up more viewing time than anything else in Nielsen’s streaming ratings.
The ratings service’s year-end totals have Bluey at 45.2 billion minutes of viewing time on Disney+, leading the rankings for the second straight year (it also finished second overall to Suits in 2023). Grey’s Anatomy and its more than 450-episode library took second place with 40.92 billion minutes of viewing on Netflix and Hulu, and Stranger Things (39.95 billion minutes) came in third overall.
Nielsen says U.S. viewers watched a staggering 16.7 trillion minutes of programming on streaming platforms last year, up 19 percent from 2024. That equates to 31.7. million years of linear time.
Stranger Things’ final season debuted on Nov. 26, and in the last five full weeks of the year (Nielsen’s totals are for Dec. 30, 2024-Dec. 28, 2025), the show recorded 25.1 billion viewing minutes — that by itself would have led all original shows for the year. The No. 2 original, Squid Game, clocked in at 22.41 billion minutes of watch time. Nielsen’s calendar also means that Stranger Things’ total doesn’t include any viewing for the series finale, which began streaming on Dec. 31.
Netflix and Sony’s KPop Demon Hunters was far and away the most streamed movie of 2025 with 20.55 billion minutes of viewing — more than double the total for the next most-watched film, Moana 2 (9.43 billion). Nielsen broke down the movie rankings between kids films and “general interest” movies for the first time, with Happy Gilmore 2 (7.07 billion minutes) leading the latter chart.
Nielsen styles its year-end rankings as awards it calls the ARTEYs, both as a nod to founder Arthur C. Nielsen and an acronym for Audience Rated Television Entertainment of the Year. In that vein, it handed out a “Streaming Icon” honor to Seth MacFarlane, whose shows and movies — led by No. 7 overall series Family Guy (33.37 billion viewing minutes) — amassed more than 60 billion minutes of watch time last year.
“I want to thank Nielsen for this Streaming Icon Award,” MacFarlane said in a statement. It’s a high honor to receive the first prize in show business that isn’t determined by quality.”
Nielsen also noted that The Pitt was the biggest new streaming series of the year with 11.4 billion minutes of viewing on HBO Max, putting it a little outside the top 10. Second among new original shows was Netflix’s murder mystery The Residence at 9.5 billion minutes (which were not enough to keep the show from being one and done). Running Point (5.1 billion viewing minutes) and The Four Seasons (5 billion), both on Netflix, were the top new comedies.
The most binged title of the year was the classic western Gunsmoke. The series, which ran from 1955-75, streams on Paramount+, Pluto TV and Peacock, and per Nielsen, its 22.5 billion minutes of watch time equates to 241 episodes (out of 404 available on various platforms) per viewer.
Nielsen’s top 10s in streaming for 2025 are below.
