Animation has long been one of Netflix’s greatest offerings, and the streamer deserves its props for carving out a space for some of the best animated TV shows ever made that appeal to a wide audience. But unlike so many animated shows that were canceled too soon, these animated hits have thrived long enough to earn loyal fanbases and build upon what made their first outing so great.
There are raunchy adult comedies on here, fantasy adventures, and even experimental sci-fi anthologies that are redefining our understanding of animated television. Some of these Netflix animated shows are even considered masterpieces, and the ones that became multi-season successes absolutely deserve your time.
Paradise PD (2018–2022)
Comedy, 4 Seasons
Paradise PD follows a small-town police department run by complete incompetence and corruption, from Chief Crawford’s dysfunction to rookie Kevin’s blunders (he shot his dad’s testicles) and Bullet the dog’s drug habits. Arguably an animated sitcom that’s better than Family Guy, the show thrives on ironic adult situations within a workplace comedy that’s filled with gross-out gags and no-holds-barred satire of authority figures.
The show originally started out by mocking conventional cop dramas, but by season 4, it descends into literal multiversal battles between alternate versions of the main characters. Paradise PD subverts your expectations by becoming stranger each season, but that worked to the show’s benefit. Its commitment to excess built a cult following that kept Paradise PD alive far longer than I expected.
Big Mouth (2017–2025)
Comedy, 8 Seasons
Big Mouth explicitly catalogs the awkward mess of puberty through perverse hormone monsters, shame wizards, and talking sex pillows. It wouldn’t be nearly as funny without Big Mouth’s ensemble cast from Nick Kroll, John Mulaney, Jessi Klein, Jason Mantzoukas, and many more. The animation exaggeration is absolutely absurd, and it wears its gross humor like a badge of honor.
Unlike a ton of animated shows where the characters never age, the Big Mouth characters grow, stumble, and change in ways that mirror real adolescence. The best Big Mouth episodes tackled serious topics like body image, queer identity, anxiety, and consent. We follow Nick and Andrew from middle school through high school, and yes, it’s absolutely raunchy, but Big Mouth also weaves in sincere touches across its impressive eight-season run.
F Is for Family (2015–2021)
Comedy-Drama, 5 Seasons
Set in the 1970s, F Is for Family dives into the Murphy household, where Frank Murphy’s (Bill Burr) short temper collides with financial struggles, shifting gender roles, and everyday dysfunction. It’s a period piece that leans on nostalgia, for comfort, for sure, but also to critique the hollow promises of the American Dream. If you love shows like Bob’s Burgers, add this to the queue—but just know it’s much more offensive.
Across five F Is for Family seasons, Sue’s frustrations with domestic limits, Kevin’s failures as a would-be rock star, and Frank’s cycle of anger and regret depicted a family wrangling over what their lives could have been. By its later seasons, the comedy was still sharp, but its focus on the consequences of fleeting hope made it one of Netflix’s most unexpectedly moving animated shows.
Blood of Zeus (2020–2025)
Fantasy, 3 Seasons
Blood of Zeus reimagines classical mythology through Heron, a mortal who learns he is the son of Zeus, and across three seasons he’s caught in the crossfire of Olympian rivalries, demonic armies, and his tragic half-brother Seraphim. Animated by Powerhouse, the studio behind Castlevania, the series seriously has some of the best anime-inspired action sequences.
Season 1 introduces Zeus, Hera, and Seraphim’s moral grayness; Season 2 expanded further into Hades’ underworld politics; and its final season cleanly wrapped up the arcs that preceded it. If that doesn’t convince you, consider how it scored 100% on Rotten Tomatoes across every season. Netflix may spit out content on a weekly basis, but Blood of Zeus is an example of capturing Zeus’s lightning in a bottle.
Disenchantment (2018–2023)
Fantasy Comedy, 3 Seasons (5 Parts)
From The Simpsons and Futurama’s Matt Groening, Disenchantment follows Princess Bean, her elf companion Elfo, and demon Luci through the medieval kingdom of Dreamland. While Disenchantment was initially pitched as a fantasy comedy, more in line with shows like Futurama, it gradually evolved into something more serialized rather than a story-of-the-week format.
Dreamland’s clashes with industrial Steamland added a cultural bite to gender issues and technological expansion, while Bean’s rivalry with her mother Dagmar was more intimately sentimental. By Disenchantment’s ending, which staged a climactic mother-daughter showdown, the series ended on its own terms with satisfying payoffs established from earlier seasons.
Love, Death & Robots (2019–2025)
Sci-Fi Anthology, 4 Volumes
A bold anthology from Deadpool’s Tim Miller and Seven’s David Fincher, Love, Death & Robots collects short, experimental animated films across all of speculative fiction, from sci-fi horror, surreal fantasy, to dystopian satire. Every episode commissions new studios and encourages their own stylistic techniques, from hyper-realistic CGI to 2D hand-drawn art—and episodes rarely run more than 20 minutes.
Some of the best Love, Death, & Robots episodes like “Life Hutch,” “Zima Blue,” and the Emmy-winning “Jibaro” showed how animation can rival live-action in artistry and emotional impact. Sure, the quality varies from story to story, but that’s the thing: you might love what I didn’t; the anthology’s artistic freedom allows for that subjectivity. The format makes each season an event as audiences tune in to see which shorts become instant classics.
Hilda (2018–2023)
Adventure / Fantasy, 3 Seasons + Movie
Hilda follows a fearless, blue‑haired girl who moves from the wilderness to the city of Trolberg. Alongside her deerfox Twig and friends Frida and David, she dwells at the boundary between human society and magical creatures, of trolls, elves, and giants, and uncovers mysteries about her own origins. It’s a rare animated show that maintains its flawless quality from start to finish.
The most obvious strength of Hilda is its gorgeous visuals, but it also strikes such a pleasing tone between whimsy and sincerity. There’s a coziness to its art style, a fusion of Tintin and Ghibli, that evokes a rate fantasy world you’d want to exist in. But make no mistake, Hilda doesn’t shy from darker themes— from fear, displacement, or prejudice toward magical “others”—and it does so with tactical restraint and empathy.
The Dragon Prince (2018–2024)
Fantasy Adventure, 7 Seasons
The Dragon Prince centers on princes Callum and Ezran and the Moonshadow elf Rayla as they seek to reunite the Dragon Prince and bridge the worlds of humans and magical creatures. Over seven seasons of The Dragon Prince, the show expands from a quest narrative into a saga of prophecy and power.
From its intriguing magic system (six primal sources) and cultural tensions across the realms, The Dragon Prince offers some of the best worldbuilding in fantasy TV—animated or live-action. Villains like Viren and Claudia aren’t one-note either; they’re compelling competitors who teeter between their own genuine motivations and the corruption required to achieve them. Later seasons may not have been as strong, but it’s a rare treat for a fantasy show to end on its own terms.
BoJack Horseman (2014–2020)
Comedy‑Drama, 6 Seasons
Set in a world of humans and anthropomorphic animals, BoJack Horseman’s a washed-up former ’90s sitcom star (a literal horse, too) as he struggles with fame, addiction, and an emotional bag stuffed with regrets and bad decisions. As the seasons progress, it moves from Hollywood satire into a far deeper character study about how Hollywood shaped BoJack into a, at times despicable, self-loather.
BoJack’s cycle of self-sabotage, Diane’s own crises, and Todd’s identity explorations—they all start off amusing until, suddenly, their arcs turn tragic. Rather than reset periodically, every Bojack episode builds on the characters’ past trauma, allowing them to evolve (or devolve), and its unflinching willingness to go to surreal, experimental tonal places without losing thematic coherence is exactly why it lasted six incredible seasons, no notes.
Castlevania (2017–2021)
Action‑Adventure / Horror, 4 Seasons
Based on the iconic Castlevania video games, Castlevania follows Trevor Belmont, Sypha, and Alucard as they battle Dracula’s forces in a gothic, monster‑infested world. The show slows down the game’s pace to worldbuild upon religious zealotry and personal vendettas. That’s not even mentioning the cathartic blood-spattered madness.
Like Avatar: The Last Airbender, Castlevania marries Japanese anime aesthetics with Western storytelling. Most of Netflix’s original game adaptations do. As hinted at in the lore, Dracula is a grieving husband and ideological zealot, not just an evil vampire. For many fans, myself included, it remains one of the few video game adaptations that truly got it right. Netflix has a great track record with that.