The 13 Best Netflix Original Horror Movies, Ranked

Netflix releases so many scary movies that it's hard to keep track - these are the streamer's best horror originals The post The 13 Best Netflix Original Horror Movies, Ranked appeared first on TheWrap.

May 25, 2025 - 11:10

The 13 Best Netflix Original Horror Movies, Ranked

It’s a cliché but it’s a cliché for a reason: Netflix puts out so many movies that most people never even hear about them. That sucks, because while they can’t all be bangers, a lot of those Netflix Originals deserve an audience. Especially their horror flicks, because believe it or not they’ve put out a lot of fantastic scary flicks for fans of all ages.

Let’s take a look at the best Netflix Original horror movies, shall we…?

Lucy Boynton in ‘I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House’ (Netflix)

13. ‘I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives Inside the House’ (2016)

Before his big, breakout hits “Longlegs” and “The Monkey,” Osgood Perkins lurked in Hollywood’s shadows, quietly gaining cinematic power with artsy, eerie sleepers like “I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House.” Ruth Wilson (“Luther”) stars as a nurse hired to live in an old, old house and care for a famous horror author with dementia. Maybe she’s getting obsessed with her patient’s scary novels. Maybe the house has a black mold problem. Maybe it’s haunted. Maybe all three. “I Am the Pretty Thing That Lives in the House” is light on plot but heavy on atmosphere, and leaves you feeling deeply unsettled.

‘There’s Someone Inside Your House’ (Netflix)

12. ‘There’s Someone Inside Your House’ (2021)

One of the hardest things for any new slasher is to come up with a new and scary disguise. We’re running out of original ideas on that front, but Patrick Brice’s “There’s Someone Inside Your House” has an inspired approach. In this movie about teenagers getting murdered (inside their house), the killer appears wearing a mask that looks exactly like their victims’ face. Damn, that’s eerie. Brice directs the hell out of this scary movie, which hits most of the familiar slasher movie beats but hits them hard. A great cast and memorable characters help too. “There’s Someone Inside Your House” is one of Netflix’s most overlooked horror flicks.

11. ‘It’s What’s Inside’ (2024)

A group of college friends reunite for a party, and the black sheep of the group — who was mysterious drummed out of school for something his friends did — shows up too. He’s got a new party game, a prototype machine that makes all the attendees switch bodies. The novelty wears off quickly when someone dies inside the wrong body, and there’s no one left to switch to, so panic and betrayal sets in. Greg Jardin’s smartly conceived mindfuck movie could be hard to follow, but a clever color palette keeps the twisty-turny plot easy to follow. Mean-spirited indie sci-fi/horror at its finest.

10. ‘Bird Box’ (2018)

Looking back it’s almost hard to believe that Netflix’s breakout hit “Bird Box,” about a mysterious event that forces everyone to stay inside and only go out if they cover their face, was released prior to the COVID pandemic. In retrospect it’s practically on the nose. Directed by Oscar-winner Susanne Bier, the film stars Sandra Bullock as a pregnant single mother who gets stuck inside a house with a bunch of agitated strangers, because there’s something outside that makes you kill yourself if you look at it. It’s got an intriguing premise and a stacked case — Bullock is joined by John Malkovich, Trevante Rhodes, Lil Rel Howery, Jacki Weaver, BD Wong, the list goes on like this — so who cares if the themes are a little muddled?

Bérénice Bejo in ‘Under Paris’ (Netflix)

9. ‘Under Paris’ (2024)

There’s a giant shark in the Seine. That’s it, that’s the concept. Xavier Gens manages to take a pretty silly idea, right out of the SyFy Channel gene pool, and turn it into a genuinely satisfying monster movie. Oscar-nominee Bérénice Bejo stars as a marine biologist who tries to save Paris from a disaster, but overzealous eco-terrorists and incompetent politicians screw up all her best laid plans, until finally Olympic swimmers get turned into a smorgasbord. “Under Paris” is a lark but it isn’t brainless. By the film’s holy-crap-they-really-went-there conclusion you’ll see just how big a point Gens is making.

Krysten Ritter in ‘Nightbooks’ (Netflix)

8. ‘Nightbooks’ (2021)

Horror for kids is still horror! In this scary bedtime story come to life, Krysten Ritter stars as a wicked witch who kidnaps a little boy and forces him to write scary bedtime stories. As he digs deeper into her mysterious past, and struggles to come up with new nightmares every day, Ritter vamps it up like nobody’s business, stealing the movie and our poisoned little hearts. Adults probably won’t be frightened by “Nightbooks” but it’s a great introduction to the genre for kids, wisely bridging the gap between fairy tales and serious horror stories, with a little YA world-building thrown in for flavor.

Zawe Ashton in ‘Velvet Buzzsaw’ (Netflix)

7. ‘Velvet Buzzsaw’ (2019)

Dan Gilroy made an impressive directorial debut with the Oscar-nominated “Nightcrawler,” which starred Jake Gyllenhaal as a creepy weirdo who finds a deadly path to success in Los Angeles. The director and actor reunite in “Velvet Buzzsaw,” an even deadlier story about an even creepier weirdo. Gyllenhaal plays a stuck up art critic who gets involved in a series of mysterious paintings, made by a mad genius, which start to supernaturally devour their way through the snooty art world. “Velvet Buzzsaw” is mostly about people who have their heads stuck up their own ass, so it makes sense that the movie is also pretentious and a little insufferable. But it’s angry at the right things. What a strikingly weird dalliance in the horror genre.

Allison Williams and Logan Browning in ‘The Perfection’ (Netflix)

6. ‘The Perfection’ (2019)

Another freaky fright flick about so-called “high art,” Richard Shepard’s “The Perfection” stars Allison Williams as a concert cellist who left the business to take care of her dying mother. When she returns she finds a new wunderkind, played by Logan Browning, and they become lovers. That’s when things get hallucinogenic, and a little self-mutilate-y, before revealing what “The Perfection” was really about all along. Let’s not spoil that. Shepard’s film is upsettingly bleak and should probably come with no small number of content warnings, but it’s fascinatingly pissed-off cinema, and it’s scary as hell.

vampires-vs-the-bronx-netflix — (Netflix)

5. ‘Vampires vs. The Bronx’ (2020)

Every generation should have it’s own “The Lost Boys,” and “Vampires vs. the Bronx” is a damn good “The Lost Boys.” The film takes place in the Bronx — naturally — where a mysterious company has been buying up all the real estate, gentrifying the hell out of the neighborhood, and murdering any property owners giving them trouble. Oh yeah, and they’re vampires. A group of teenagers, whose expertise in vampires is limited to what they learned from the movie “Blade,” have to band together and save their neighborhood in more ways than one. Smart, funny, excellent teen horror. It should already be a cult hit, but give it a few more years. It’ll get there.

4. ‘His House’ (2020)

The problem with every haunted house movie is… why don’t they just leave the house? Remi Weekes’ powerful supernatural thriller has one of the best answers on record. The residents — played by Sope Diris, and Wunmi Mosaku from ‘Sinners’ — are immigrants in free government housing, and if they leave they’ll be deported back to their war-torn country. So they’re trapped in a ramshackle house with their regrets, their pain, and a night witch, which promises to bring their dead daughter back to life in exchange for something horrible. Few modern horror movies have protagonists this haunted, and both Dirisu and Mosaku act the hell out of their powerful parts.

Carla Gugino in ‘Gerald’s Game’ (Netflix)

3. ‘Gerald’s Game’ (2017)

Mike Flanagan’s first adaptation of a Stephen King novel — before he got around to “Doctor Sleep” and “The Life of Chuck” — is this claustrophobic and vicious thriller, starring Carla Gugino as a woman whose husband, played by Bruce Greenwood, tries to rekindle their sexual relationship. So he handcuffs her to the bed and… promptly dies of a heart attack. He used real handcuffs, the bed is sturdy as hell, and she’s in the middle of nowhere, with no phone in sight. So begins a terrifying story of self-reliance, as she relives her past in a frantic urge to either come up with an escape plan, come to terms with her horrible life, or both. Gugino gives an all-timer performance and Flanagan proved, not for the last time, that he gets Stephen King as well, or better, than any other filmmaker ever has.

fear-street-1994-image — Maya Hawke in ‘Fear Street’ (Netflix)

2. ‘Fear Street’ (2021)

Who would have thought than an R.L. Stine adaptation would become one of the most ambitious Netflix movies on record? Leigh Janiak directs not one, but three interconnected horror movies about queer teens in Shadyside, a town where an ancient evil has been possessing citizens and turning them into mass murderers for hundreds of years. The first volume is inspired by 1990s slasher flicks, the second (and best) is based on summer camp horror classics, and the third installment takes us into the distant past with a folk horror vibe. Inspired, inventive filmmaking with a fantastic cast of characters and rip-roaring entertainment value. (The fourth installment, “Fear Street: Prom Queen,” is a modest slasher with some fun kills, but it doesn’t a candle to the original trilogy.)

1. ‘Cam’ (2018)

Daniel Goldhaber’s directorial debut is one of the best and most respectful films made about modern sex work, and it’s also a terrifying supernatural thriller about online identity. Madeline Brewer stars as a camgirl whose content involves a creepy horror influence. One day she realizes she can’t log into her account, because she’s already online and streaming. Except, of course, that’s not her on camera — or is it? Paranoia and the uncanny swirl to a dizzying degree, and eventually force our protagonist to take matters into her own hands and reclaim what the internet has taken from her. The kind of horror movie that literally couldn’t have been made a few decades ago, “Cam” is a truly modern classic.

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