Netflix's most popular show of all time with 1,718,800,000 hours watched had one of the smallest budgets
Season 2 is just around the corner
Featured Image Credit: ROBYN BECK / Contributor / Getty
While there's been a recent boom in streaming services, Netflix is still king of the castle.
Managing to bat off competition from Disney+, Amazon Prime, and more, the streaming giant has come a long way from when we used to get DVDs in the mail.
One of Netflix's big wins is its roster of original programming that's given us everything from The Witcher to Stranger Things, Squid Game to Bridgerton.
Despite Netflix slapping a ban on password sharing, it reportedly made $39 billion in revenue in 2024 and boasted a 15.7% increase from 2023.
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There are all the usual grumbles about users vowing to cancel their subscription over more price hikes, whereas some are just getting on with it as usual.
Netflix tries to keep us hooked with an impressive lineup of movies and shows, but when it comes to its biggest export, you might be surprised by the winner.
While we know it must be expensive to build the Upside Down for Stranger Things or bring a Hollywood A-lister like Liam Hemsworth on to replace Henry Cavill on The Witcher, Netflix's 'biggest' show had a pretty tiny budget.
The Jenna Ortega-led Wednesday had us all clicking our fingers to The Addams Family theme tune, and with 252,100,000 views, Tudum reports that it's by far and away the platform's biggest English language show.
To put it into context, Stranger Things season 4 is in second with 140,700,000 views. It's true that Stranger Things has more hours watched with 1,838,000,000 compared to Wednesday's 1,718,800,000, but the kooky series still comes out on top.
Elsewhere, the top five is rounded out by Dahmer – Monster: The Jeffrey Dahmer Story, Bridgerton season 1, and The Queen's Gambit.
Quartz lists the most expensive Netflix shows ever made, with Stranger Things coming in at a jaw-dropping $30 million per episode. In contrast, it's estimated that Wednesday season 2 will only cost between $5 million to $7 million per episode to make.
Whether that takes into account the added cost of casting Lady Gaga is unknown, but either way, it costs relative pennies compared to some of the others.
Even though Wednesday only debuted in November 2022, it was quickly renewed for a second season in January 2023. Hyping the next run of episodes, Ortega has promised Variety that it will "lean into the horror aspect" and will be "ditching any romantic love interest for Wednesday."
Boasting an all-star cast of Luis Guzmán, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and even a role for Christina Ricci after she played Wednesday in the '90s Addams Family movies. With Gaga sure to give us a musical interlude on par with season 1's viral dance scene, we're confident that Wednesday season 2 will soon be topping the charts again.