10 Best Netflix Shows With Fewer Than 20 Episodes, Ranked

Let’s be honest: There’s a lot of TV out there these days and not everyone has time to watch it all. Some of the best shows are also some of the longest-running shows with hours of content to view, which means they can take up an unacceptable amount of your precious free time.

Luckily, there’s a strategy for the busy person who still wants to watch the full episode catalog of some great modern TV. Netflix has a lot of original series with tight writing, terrific performances, and solid production value that don’t have a massive episode count to keep you tethered to one show for too long. Whether it’s a limited series, something canceled too soon, or one installment of an anthology series, there’s a lot of shows that a dedicated TV enthusiast can take down quickly. That allows TV completionists to move right along to the next new series rather than being trapped choking down Season 15 of something they’ve been over since Season 5.

To help you pick your next speedy, high-quality binge-watch, we’ve compiled a list of 10 of the best Netflix original series that will only demand you watch 20 or fewer episodes to be able to say you’ve done the whole thing.

10. Mindhunter

As true crime continues to capture the public consciousness, this series takes real-life figures on both sides of the law and dramatizes compelling narratives with them. The show is based on the book “Mindhunter: Inside the FBI’s Elite Serial Crime Unit” by Mark Olshaker and John E. Douglas, who was the chief of the FBI’s Behavioral Sciences Unit. Douglas developed methods to profile serial killers and mass murderers based on interviews with some of America’s most violent and notorious killers.

The show has a similar, but fictionalized, structure. It follows two FBI agents in the 1970s as they interview serial killers like Ed Kemper, Richard Speck, and David Berkowitz. Together, they delve into the depraved minds of these murderers to discover patterns, allowing them to pioneer the idea of modern criminal profiling.

The show was co-produced by acclaimed director David Fincher, who made dark crime hits like “Zodiac,” “Gone Girl,” and “Seven.” In addition to producing, Fincher directed seven episodes of the series’ two seasons, with Vanity Fair noting that he was essentially the showrunner, ensuring the whole series carries his signature look and style.

Sadly, it seems a third season of “Mindhunter” isn’t in the cards (and there’s some conflicting comments with Netflix boss Ted Sarandos saying one thing about “Mindhunter” ending and David Fincher saying another thing about “Mindhunter” Season 3). That means there are only 19 episodes in total.

9. The Midnight Club

If you’re a fan of horror, you’ve likely watched one of Mike Flanagan’s immensely popular scary tales, many of which are Netflix originals. Among them is “The Midnight Club.” Based on the novel of the same name by author Christopher Pike, the series has one of the creepiest premises out there.

The show follows a group of eight teens who are all at a hospice facility battling a terminal illness. To keep things light and find some camaraderie among all the death and sadness, they form The Midnight Club. Every night, they meet in the library at midnight to swap ghost stories. Eventually, they make a pact that the first one of them to inevitably die will do everything in their power to haunt the group to prove there’s something waiting for them on the other side.

The show’s premise allows it to not only have an overarching main story, but it dramatically depicts some of the ghost stories the group tells one another in “Are You Afraid of the Dark”-style act outs.

Although “The Midnight Club” was canceled after only one season, consisting of 10 episodes, each one packs a horror punch that’s sure to leave the viewer a little creeped out.

8. The Queen’s Gambit

You may have heard of this Netflix original miniseries, given that it was briefly the number one scripted show on the entire platform after it came out in 2020. If that didn’t put it on your radar, perhaps its 18 Primetime Emmy nominations and 11 wins did the trick.

The show, which is based on a novel of the same name by author Walter Tevis, follows an orphaned chess prodigy in Kentucky during the 1950s and 1960s. It is essentially a coming-of-age story about a woman, played by Emmys best-actress-winning Anya Taylor-Joy, as she embarks on a quest to become a world-class chess player. Although she has a brilliant mind and a superior acumen for the game, all of her success and progress in the world of chess is made more difficult by the fact that she’s struggling with a drug and alcohol addiction that began in her youth while living at the orphanage.

The show was billed by Netflix as a limited series, meaning it was intended to tell the entirety of its story in its seven-episode run. So, it’s a great drama to binge-watch over a weekend to cross another Emmy-winning, prestigious TV series off your list.

7. The Residence

Who doesn’t love a classic, high-stakes whodunnit?

That’s what’s on offer with “The Residence.” The show is produced by Shondaland, the production company founded by acclaimed TV creator Shonda Rhimes, best known for creating hits like “Grey’s Anatomy,” “Scandal,” “How to Get Away with Murder,” and more.

Like all great murder mysteries, the show follows an eccentric detective, in this case played by “Orange Is the New Black” breakout star Uzo Aduba. When a person is murdered during a state dinner with a foreign leader at the most secure building in the country, the White House, her character is tasked with figuring out who the culprit is and why. As the show progresses, the investigator is forced to get into the weeds of the staff that makes the White House run smoothly every day.

From big-time delegates and security personnel to lower-level cooks and cleaners, everyone is a suspect, and there’s a surprising amount of bad blood between them.

The show premiered its eight-episode first season in 2025. Sadly, Netflix canceled “The Residence” after one season. The good news, though, is that it makes it an easy binge-watch for those looking for a little more mystery in their TV viewing.

6. Inventing Anna

In May of 2018, New York Magazine published an article telling the long, bizarre, and storied tale of Anna “Delvey” Sorokin and the years-long scam she pulled on some of New York City’s most wealthy elite.

It’s worth mentioning, though, that while most of the characters and events are based on the article,sler

5. Baby Reindeer

Comedian Richard Gadd stars in this semi-autobiographical dark comedy that he adapted from his acclaimed one-man show that he wrote and debuted at Edinburgh Fringe.

The premise of “Baby Reindeer” is pretty simple: Gadd plays Donny Dunn, a struggling comedian in London who is working as a bartender to make ends meet. One day a distraught woman, Martha (Jessica Gunning), comes in and Donny, thinking he’s just doing a kind deed, offers her a free cup of tea.

What he could not have known was that the woman would develop a very peculiar attachment to him, resulting in her stalking his entire life. As the story unfolds, it becomes clear that there is a lot more to Martha than meets the eye, and her behavior may stem from a perplexing backstory.

She’s not the only one.

In a surprisingly heartfelt turn, the stalking forces Donny to look inward at his own sexuality and even confront the fallout and trauma of a sexual assault he experienced in the past. The seven-episode “Baby Reindeer” won six Primetime Emmy Awards, including outstanding limited or anthology series in 2024.

4. The Haunting of Hill House

No one does gothic storytelling quite like “The Haunting of Hill House” creator and director Mike Flanagan. The story — based on a 1959 Shirley Jackson novel — is told throughout various points in time from the vantage point of the Craine family. When the siblings of the household were young, their parents moved them into a fixer upper. While there, they all experienced some form of paranormal activity in the house. Decades later, the kids are all grown up, and the family has its problems. However, an incident happens that brings them all back together, creating the spark that allows them to realize the events of their time in Hill House have continued to shape them, even haunt them, into adulthood.

A word of advice for anyone hoping to binge-watch this 10-episode spooky family drama: Don’t take your eyes off the screen. While it may be tempting to check out your phone or let your attention otherwise wander, Flanagan hides some pretty impressive scares and Easter eggs in “The Haunting of Hill House.”

3. Adolescence

This award-winning series catches the audience from moment one, and the action does not stop until the credits roll on each episode. That’s because each of the show’s lengthy four episodes are done in one long, continuous, and incredibly impressive single shot. There are no cuts in “Adolescence,” just a single camera take and some truly impeccable on-screen talent to carry the viewer through.

The story begins with police raiding the home of a 13-year-old boy they suspect of murdering a female classmate. As the investigation unfolds, it becomes clear that the boy’s views of the world, and women, have been shaped heavily by the online manosphere. As police grapple with a world they don’t fully understand, and the boy’s family spirals out of control trying to figure out how all of this negativity and ill-intent could cultivate right under their noses, viewers see just how much one crime can impact an entire community.

There is a lot of stellar acting in “Adolescence”; many of its cast even received Emmy attention. However, one worth noting in particular is Stephen Graham, a familiar face you may recognize from other films who not only gave an Emmy-winning performance but co-wrote the series.

2. Russian Doll

Starring reliable crowd pleaser Natasha Lyonne, “Russian Doll” is a dark comedy drama with some science fiction elements that will keep viewers guessing until the very end.

Season 1 tells the story of a woman who, while celebrating her 36th birthday in New York City, finds herself caught in a grim time loop. Unlike your standard “Groundhog Day” time loop, this one is predicated on her death. Whether she’s hit by a car, freezes to death, or a myriad of other ways one can meet their end, when the Grim Reaper comes for her, she wakes up again in the bathroom of her 36th birthday party.

Luckily, she soon learns she’s not alone in this fate.

Season 2 tells a different story, but with the same characters. This time they’re plagued not by a time loop, but by time travel, and they’re forced to go on yet another adventure that they don’t fully understand.

While it may seem like a fun, science fiction romp, it goes to some dark places as the characters use their strange new circumstances to confront some realities about their lives and identities.

1. Beef

The first season of “Beef” premiered as a Netflix original series in 2023 starring Steven Yeun and Ali Wong as a pair of strangers whose lives are intertwined after they catch each other on the wrong day during a road rage incident. The beef between them escalates to dark, dramatic, and hilarious levels over the course of months.

Three years later, Netflix made the decision to turn “Beef” into an anthology series and launched an eight-episode second season about a wealthy couple, played by Oscar Isaac and Carey Mulligan, who are photographed during a particularly bad fight by another, less affluent couple — played by Cailee Spaeny and Charles Melton. The ensuing animosity, and even blackmail, that incident sends the entire group spiraling down a bonkers path, just like the Season 1 cast.

Sadly, Netflix has not yet confirmed if there will be a third season of “Beef,” meaning it’s entirely possible the 18 episodes we have will be all there is. Luckily, for those who want to binge-watch two relatable stories of just how bad a feud can get, the show is available to view in its entirety on Netflix.