The Shocking Numbers Behind Netflix's Most Watched Movies

Netflix has been notoriously tightlipped about numbers, but now they're telling us about the hits. 

When a movie goes viral and everyone is talking about it, I assume that also means lots of people are watching it. But with streamers like Netflix, those numbers are often kept internal. That means even if a lot of people are talking about it, it's hard to tell if something is a breakout hit. 

A recent Bloomberg article gathered the numbers from Netflix to show just how viral the movies they place on their platform actually are, and the results were shocking. 

The article compiled the number of times a movie was streamed in the first 4 weeks it was on the service. This is not an aggregate of all time, just knowing how many times it was streamed in the first month. 

While we do not know how many of these clicks watched the entire movie, we do know that's a lot of times to press play.

Check out the top 10 list below.

1. Extraction – 99 Million
2. Bird Box – 89 Million
3. Spenser Confidential – 85 Million
4. 6 Underground – 83 Million
5. Murder Mystery – 73 Million
6. The Irishman – 64 Million
7. Triple Frontier – 63 Million
8. The Wrong Missy – 59 Million
9. The Platform – 56 Million
10. The Perfect Date – 48 Million

I have seen 8 of the top 10 and the other two I am sure my Mom watched. So, my family is covered. But if you look at the numbers at the top, it's crazy to think none top 100 million streams, but what we do see is a steady number of movies that have stars, are genre-forward, and actually skew more adult. 

The obvious thing that pops out here is that most of these are action films with an R-rating. That sort of answers what's most popular on the site. 

We can also see Netflix trying to establish brands here. Both Extraction and Birdbox are getting sequels, and Spenser Confidential was based on a series, so you could expect another one of those once shooting begins again. 

Bloomberg notes: “All 10 of the movies were released in the last 3 years, most of them in the past 12 months, which makes sense when you consider that Netflix has added 43.6 million customers since the start of 2019. Each new release can reach a larger audience than its predecessors.”

And that's all part of the plan. Netflix is well on its way to dominance here. Netflix CEO Scott Stuber said, "We want an impactful movie every two weeks...For one person, that’s Extraction. For another, it’s The Wrong Missy."

This diverse array of cinema could mark the future for streamers. Right now, Netflix has almost no competition in this release strategy, but only time will tell if Amazon and Disney+...and even HBO Max...pick up scripts to try to release movies that compete. 

What Netflix movie have you watched the most? Let us know in the comments.