How to watch the Harry Potter movies in order: chronological and release date
Watching the Harry Potter movies in order all in one go can be a really fun experience for fans both old and new. There are eight films to watch (11 if you include the Fantastic Beasts prequel series) in total, bringing the magical series to life on screen.
The Harry Potter movies follow the story of the boy wizard’s adventures at the legendary Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry as he navigates the complexities of growing up while confronting the malevolent forces of Lord Voldemort. The magic now extends beyond the original series to the Fantastic Beasts saga, set decades earlier, and the stage play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. A new TV adaptation of the books is also in the works at streaming service Max, one of the best streaming services.
In our guide below we’ll tell you how to watch the Harry Potter movies in order, from Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (Philosopher's Stone in the UK) to the most recent, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore. Whether you want to watch the series in chronological order or in the sequence they were released, we explain where you can stream them at home in the US, UK and Australia.
Harry Potter movies in chronological order
Want to know how to watch the Harry Potter movies – and the Fantastic Beasts prequel series – in chronological order? Allow us to steer you in the right direction.
To date there are eight Harry Potter films, and three installments in the Fantastic Beasts saga.
The Fantastic Beasts prequel series is set many decades before Harry, Ron and Hermione's time at Hogwarts. Warner Bros. originally planned to make five Fantastic Beasts movies, but it now looks like that the third entry in the saga, The Secrets of Dumbledore, will be the last. It received mixed reviews on its theatrical release, and was the lowest-grossing film in the entire franchise – in fact, according to Variety, it barely broke even at the box office. When asked about the future of the series in January 2023, star Eddie Redmayne told NME: "There's nothing [planned] that I'm aware of".
In this list of Harry Potter movies in chronological order, we've included everything Potter-related that's available to watch right now – including popular Broadway/West End stage play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child.
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (set in 1926)
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (set in 1927)
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (set in 1932)
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (set in 1991-92)
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (set in 1992-93)
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (set in 1992-94)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (set in 1994-95)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (set in 1995-96)
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (set in 1996-97)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (set in 1997-98)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (set in 1997-98)
Harry Potter and the Cursed Child (the hit stage play, set in 2017-2020)
Aside from the occasional flashback, the franchise's Hogwarts-based movies follow a simple linear structure, owing to author JK Rowling’s decision to use the British academic calendar as a framework for her narrative. That means each of the seven books in the Potter series is set in a different September-August school year, starting in 1991 when Harry was 11 years old.
While the movies were made in the 2000s – and feature the occasional anachronism such as 21st century mobile phones or music – it’s likely they follow the same carefully crafted timeline as Rowling’s books. That places the Harry Potter films some 60-70 years after their Fantastic Beasts counterparts in the Wizarding World canon.
And the story of the "boy who lived" continues beyond his final reckoning with Lord Voldemort – though not on screen – thanks to the hit stage play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. The story picks up in 2017, during the epilogue from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and features the now grown-up Harry, Hermione, Ron and Draco Malfoy, and their kids.
Harry Potter movies in release order
There are no complicated interweaving timelines to deal with if you watch the Harry Potter movies in release date order. The Wizarding World film franchise consists of two distinct series, with a set of prequels following on from the parent saga. That means there’s no need to introduce any kind of Star Wars-style 'Machete Order' just yet. (You can check out how that unconventional viewing sequence works in our how to watch the Star Wars movies in order guide.)
It’s also interesting to note that there are more Harry Potter movies than there are books, with final novel The Deathly Hallows split into two parts – a trick repeated by both the Twilight and The Hunger Games series – because there was so much story to cram in. Besides, all the extra box office cash earned by an extra Potter film won't have hurt Warner Bros.' bottom line.
Here are the 11 Harry Potter movies in release date order:
Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone (2001)
Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (2002)
Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban (2004)
Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire (2005)
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix (2007)
Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (2009)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (2010)
Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (2011)
Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016)
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald (2018)
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore (2022)
Harry Potter movies: where to watch online
In the US, all 11 Wizarding World movies are available on the Warner Bros. Discovery-owned Max. The eight Harry Potter films are also available on Peacock, thanks to a deal signed between Warner and NBCUniversal Media back in 2016, which sees the American streaming rights for the Hogwarts-set movies shared between the two conglomerates
In the UK you can watch every Wizarding World adventure on Sky Cinema. You can also catch all of the films (with the exception of the most recent entry in the series, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore) on Netflix.
If you're in Australia, it's slightly more complicated. You can watch the eight Harry Potter movies on Binge, Foxtel Now and Paramount Plus. But the Fantastic Beasts films are split between a few streamers. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them is on Binge and Paramount Plus; The Crimes of Grindelwald is on Netflix, Binge, Foxtel Now and Paramount Plus; and, at the time of writing, The Secrets of Dumbledore can't be streamed at all but only bought through Apple TV+ or Amazon's Prime Video.
Read this article to find out more about how to watch Harry Potter movies online.
Every Harry Potter movie ranked
As with the Harry Potter novels, fans tend to have different opinions on which films in the series are the best. Ranking the Harry Potter movies by their IMDb user scores subsequently throws up remarkably consistent results, with all eight installments clustered between 7.4 and 8.1 out of 10. (For TechRadar's opinion on the subject, see our in-depth ranked guide on the best Harry Potter movies around).
The three Fantastic Beasts movies are clearly the least loved releases in the Wizarding World franchise. This is possibly why the second movie suffered a near 20% drop at the box office compared to its predecessor, while the third entry in the series dropped a further 38% after that (according to figures on Box Office Mojo).
The most successful of the three, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, made less money than all-but-one of the Harry Potter movies (The Prisoner of Azkaban). But, seeing as it had 12 years of inflation on its side, it’s debatable whether it actually outperformed the third Hogwarts film in real terms.
