Why you should binge the 12 best Apple TV shows of 2025

Apple TV delivered another stellar year of television in 2025, cementing its reputation as a home for premium storytelling across genres. From stellar sci-fi to sharp Hollywood satire, here are 13 standout series that defined the best of the streaming service’s 2025 lineup of new and returning shows.

You should binge them because they’re great. And what better time to do so than during holiday downtime?

Best Apple TV shows of 2025

Apple TV proved throughout 2025 that quality trumps quantity. While its lineup may be smaller than competitors’ catalogs, the high quality receives top marks from viewers. The streaming service consistently delivers prestige programming that earns critical acclaim and awards recognition.

From Severance‘s mind-bending mysteries to The Studio‘s insider Hollywood humor, from Slow Horses‘ espionage thrills to Foundation‘s galaxy-spanning saga, Apple TV offers something compelling for every viewer.

As the year closes, the service has firmly established itself as an essential destination for television that prioritizes craftsmanship, originality and emotional resonance.

Best new Apple TV series in 2025

Pluribus

Vince Gilligan’s first series since Breaking Bad and Better Call Saul, Pluribus arrived as one of 2025’s most thought-provoking offerings. Starring Better Call Saul‘s Rhea Seehorn, this sci-fi drama explores what happens when an alien superintelligence turns most of Earth’s population into a relentlessly positive hive mind.

Seehorn plays Carol Sturka, a romantasy novelist whose negativity may be humanity’s last hope. The show tackles weighty themes about individualism, AI, neurodivergence and the nature of happiness itself. But it never feels heavy-handed. It’s funny, unpredictable and wonderfully acted — one of 2025’s best TV shows, on any streaming service.

The Studio

Seth Rogen smelted comedy gold with The Studio, his behind-the-scenes look at Hollywood chaos. Premiering in March, The Studio follows Matt Remick (played by Rogen), the newly appointed head of Continental Studios, as he struggles to balance artistic integrity with corporate demands in an increasingly IP-driven entertainment landscape.

The show features Catherine O’Hara, Kathryn Hahn and Ike Barinholtz in supporting roles, along with a parade of celebrity cameos playing exaggerated versions of themselves.

Shot with remarkable attention to cinematography and editing, the episodes unfold as self-contained stories about the making of fictional movies. Critics hailed the show as a master class in satire that manages to skewer Hollywood while maintaining genuine affection for cinema. The show earned a record-breaking 23 Emmy nominations, making it the most-nominated comedy debut in history, and went on to win 13 Emmys, including Outstanding Comedy Series.

Down Cemetery Road

After Slow Horses, engrossing thriller Down Cemetery Road is the second adaptation of Mick Herron’s novels to appear on Apple TV. It follows art restorer Sarah Trafford (Ruth Wilson). She becomes obsessed with finding a missing girl after a house explodes in her Oxford neighborhood. She enlists the help of private investigator Zoë Boehm (Emma Thompson).

What begins as a simple missing persons case quickly spirals into something far more sinister, revealing a complex conspiracy amid twists and turns. Thompson’s performance in Down Cemetery Road is fantastic. And like its Apple TV stablemate Slow Horses, it doesn’t skimp on the dark humor.

Smoke

Novelist Dennis Lehane reunited with Black Bird star Taron Egerton for Smoke, a gripping psychological crime drama that premiered in June and becmae a hit with viewers. Inspired by true events and the acclaimed Firebug podcast, Smoke follows troubled arson investigator Dave Gudsen (Egerton) as he reluctantly teams up with detective Michelle Calderone (Jurnee Smollett) to track two serial arsonists in the Pacific Northwest.

What begins as a procedural quickly transforms into an intense character study exploring trauma, masculinity and self-deception. Egerton delivers an unnerving performance, while the supporting cast — including Greg Kinnear, John Leguizamo and Ntare Guma Mbaho Mwine — adds layers of complexity to this dark exploration of people consumed by their obsessions.

Dope Thief

Ridley Scott directed the premiere episode of Dope Thief, a riveting crime thriller that debuted in spring 2025. Based on Dennis Tafoya’s novel and adapted by The Town and The Batman co-writer Peter Craig, the series stars Brian Tyree Henry and Wagner Moura as longtime Philadelphia friends who pose as Drug Enforcement Administration agents to rob small-time drug dealers.

Their grift goes catastrophically wrong when they unwittingly target a house under active DEA surveillance, plunging them into a life-and-death situation that reveals the biggest hidden narcotics corridor on the Eastern Seaboard. The series balances pulse-pounding tension with unexpectedly placed banter, creating a tale that’s both thrilling and emotionally resonant.

Murderbot

Apple TV’s sci-fi slate expanded with Murderbot, a funny adaptation that joined the ranks of Silo, For All Mankind and Foundation. Based on Martha Wells’ popular series of novels, Murderbot follows a surprisingly acerbic security robot who hacks his own programming, freeing himself of certain directives regarding killing or not killing.

The show contributed to the streamer’s reputation for high-quality science fiction programming throughout 2025, adding a healthy dose of humanity to the equation. And season two of Murderbot is on the way. 

Existing Apple TV shows that returned in 2025

Severance (season 2)

After a three-year hiatus, the award-winning workplace thriller Severance made its highly anticipated return in January. Adam Scott reprises his role as Mark Scout, whose memories remain surgically divided between work and personal life at the mysterious Lumon Industries. Season two picks up right after the explosive season one finale, with Mark and his colleagues learning the dire consequences of breaching the severance barrier.

Directed in part by Ben Stiller and created by Dan Erickson, the show garnered phenomenal reviews, earning a 95% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. It has remained in Apple TV’s Top 10 chart for more than 650 days. New cast member Gwendoline Christie joined the ensemble for season two, and the series was quickly renewed for a third season — and might spawn a pair of spinoff series.

Slow Horses (season 5)

Gary Oldman’s espionage drama Slow Horses returned for its fifth consecutive year on Apple TV in September, maintaining its remarkable consistency as one of television’s best series. Adapted from Mick Herron’s novel London Rules, season five follows the disgraced MI5 agents of Slough House as they investigate a series of bizarre events across London, all while resident tech nerd Roddy Ho inexplicably acquires a glamorous girlfriend.

The six-episode season premiered September 24 and featured Ted Lasso star Nick Mohammed as a special guest. Critics praised the season’s lighter tone, while noting it remains “one of the most compulsively watchable offerings on television.” The show earned a 96% Tomatometer score and was renewed through season seven before season five even premiered, demonstrating Apple’s confidence in the series.

Foundation (season 3)

Foundation, David S. Goyer’s epic sci-fi saga based on Isaac Asimov’s legendary book series, returned in July for its highly anticipated third season. Set 152 years after the events of season two, the new season finds the Foundation increasingly established while the Cleonic Dynasty’s Empire has dwindled. A fearsome new threat — a warlord known as “The Mule” who uses both military force and mind control — raises the stakes to galactic proportions.

Led by Emmy-nominated actors Jared Harris and Lee Pace alongside Lou Llobell, the 10-episode season earned an impressive 87% Rotten Tomatoes score. Apple TV renewed Foundation for a fourth season in September 2025, cementing its place as one of the streamer’s most ambitious and visually stunning originals.

Shrinking (season 3)

Bill Lawrence’s feel-good therapy dramedy Shrinking returned to Apple TV in late January for its third season. Jason Segel and Harrison Ford lead the ensemble cast as Jimmy and Paul, a grieving therapist and his curmudgeonly mentor, both of whom are navigating life’s messy complexities.

Ford’s performance has been a revelation. He brilliantly balances comedy and drama as Paul, Jimmy’s colleague who serves as both obstacle and support system. The show explores mental health, grief and human connection with warmth and humor, establishing itself as one of Apple TV’s most beloved series.

Mythic Quest (season 4)

After a two-year hiatus, Mythic Quest — Rob McElhenney’s workplace comedy about a video game studio — returned to Apple TV in late January. Season four reunited the ensemble cast as the team confronted new challenges in a changing gaming landscape, with stars rising, egos clashing and relationships blooming. The show maintained its sharp, incisive depiction of creative industry dynamics while digging deeper into characters’ emotional fragility.

Critics noted the series remained fresh even in its fourth season, with one reviewer calling it “the best season yet.” The 10-episode season premiered in January 29, followed by the debut of anthology spinoff Side Quest.

In April, Apple canceled Mythic Quest (but let the creators release an updated finale to provide proper closure).

Silo (season 2) 

Dystopian sci-fi series Silo continued to expand its mysterious underground world in season two, which ended in January. The show explores themes of truth, control and rebellion within a self-contained society — maybe the last people on Earth — living in a massive silo.

Nobody knows when or why the silo got built, and trying to find out can be fatal. Rebecca Ferguson stars as Juliette, an engineer who finds out “that if the lies don’t kill you, the truth will.” Apple TV already greenlit seasons three and four of Silo, which has become a fan favorite on the streamer’s impressive roster of science fiction programming.

Watch them all on Apple TV

Apple TV is available by subscription for $12.99 with a seven-day free trial. You can also get it via any tier of the Apple One subscription bundle. For a limited time, customers who purchase and activate a new iPhone, iPad, Apple TV or Mac can enjoy three months of Apple TV for free.

David Snow

David Snow, an expert on Apple hardware and software, writes on a variety of technological and cultural topics for Cult of Mac. They include Apple news, technology buying guides, and features about computer setups and Apple TV shows and movies.

With 30 years of experience covering technology and other subjects, he has written and edited for numerous print and online publications, including CMP Media, TechTV.com, CNET, Wired News, Red Herring magazine, Law.com, The National Law Journal and Law Technology News magazine. Among other roles, he served as executive editor of the Law.com network of websites and editorial director, technology, for ALM Media.

Snow graduated with a B.A. from Syracuse University with majors in magazine journalism and psychology. While there, he worked as a reporter for The Daily Orange newspaper and associate editor of Equal Time magazine.

Founder of the blog At the Waterline, he can be reached on X (formerly Twitter) via @atthewaterline and on Mastodon via @dsnow.