Dystopian thriller “Leave the World Behind” was the most-watched film — and title overall — on Netflix globally in the second half of 2023, while anime-inspired live action series “One Piece” led on the TV side.
The data comes from Netflix’s second edition of “What We Watched: A Netflix Engagement Report,” reflecting viewership on the streamer from July-December 2023 covering 99% of all viewing on Netflix. Subscribers across the world watched about 90 billion hours of Netflix in the second half of 2023, compared with 93 billion hours in the first half of the year.
Netflix released its first big data dump, covering the first half of 2023, last December. In the second report, the company has added runtime and views (total hours viewed divided by runtime) and separated films and TV series, syncing it up with its weekly Top 10 and Most Popular lists.
“Leave the World Behind,” Netflix’s No. 5 most popular movie of all time, generated 121 million views in just over three weeks after premiering Dec. 8, 2023. The movie from executive producers Barack and Michelle Obama stars Julia Roberts, Ethan Hawke, Mahershala Ali and Myha’la Herrold. “Heart of Stone,” an action-thriller starring Gal Gadot, notched nearly 110 million views in the second half of 2023.
Adam Sandler’s “Leo,” the streamer’s biggest animated film to date, notched 96 million views following its Nov. 11 release. “Nowhere,” Netflix’s third most popular non-English language film ever, garnered 86 million views.
“One Piece,” with nearly 72 million views, more than doubled viewing across Netflix’s anime film and series. That was followed by limited series “Who Is Erin Carter?” (50.1 million), “Lupin” Part 3 (49.7 million), “The Witcher” Season 3 (47.9 million) and “Sex Education” Season 4 (46.3 million).
Licensed titles also continue to be popular on Netflix. “Suits” alone had 144 million views across nine seasons in the second half of 2023, followed by “Young Sheldon” (88 million views), “Grey’s Anatomy” (51 million), “Gossip Girl” (49 million) and “Gilmore Girls” (45 million).
Other highlights from the report:
- Netflix’s biggest titles of all time — “Wednesday,” “Red Notice” and “Squid Game” — continued to pull in large audiences well after their debuts. For full-year 2023, Wednesday had 98M total views, Red Notice had 62M and Squid Game had 25M. The three titles are
- The first three parts of Netflix’s “Lupin” generated nearly 100M views in the second half of 2023, and there were nearly 200M views across CoComelon’s eight seasons. Also popular were The Witcher (76M), Virgin River (69M), The Crown (50M), Sweet Magnolias (35M), Top Boy (26M), Heartstopper (24M), Sintonia (20M), and Sweet Home (17M).
- Non-English shows and movies make up nearly a third of all viewing. Korean (9% of viewing), Spanish (7%) and Japanese (5%) language stories captured the biggest share of viewing outside of English. Stand-outs include Dear Child (53M) from Germany, Forgotten Love (43M) from Poland, Pact of Silence (21M) from Mexico, Mask Girl (19M) from Korea, Yu Yu Hakusho (17M) from Japan, Berlin (11M) from Spain, and The Railway Men (11M) from India.
- Sports has become increasingly popular, amassing a combined 184M views including Beckham (44M), Untold: Johnny Football (14M) and Quarterback (13M).
- Kids and family represented 15% of all viewing, with titles like Gabby’s Dollhouse (90M), Family Switch (62M), and The Monkey King (43M).
Here are the top 15 TV titles streamed on Netflix ranked by views for the second half of 2023:
| Title | Release Date | Total Hours Viewed | Total Runtime (Hours) | No. of Views |
| One Piece Season 1 | 2023-08-31 | 541,900,000 | 7:34 | 71,600,000 |
| Dear Child: Limited Series // Liebes Kind: Miniserie | 2023-09-07 | 252,800,000 | 4:49 | 52,500,000 |
| Who is Erin Carter?: Limited Series | 2023-08-24 | 286,200,000 | 5:43 | 50,100,000 |
| Lupin: Part 3 | 2023-10-05 | 274,300,000 | 5:31 | 49,700,000 |
| The Witcher: Season 3 | 2023-06-29 | 363,800,000 | 7:36 | 47,900,000 |
| Sex Education: Season 4 | 2023-09-21 | 374,700,000 | 8:06 | 46,300,000 |
| Beckham: Limited Series | 2023-10-04 | 208,500,000 | 4:45 | 43,900,000 |
| CoComelon: Season 8 | 2023-04-10 | 40,100,000 | 1:04 | 37,600,000 |
| Virgin River: Season 5 | 2023-09-07 | 331,400,000 | 9:16 | 35,800,000 |
| The Lincoln Lawyer: Season 2 | 2023-07-06 | 292,300,000 | 8:11 | 35,700,000 |
| Painkiller: Limited Series | 2023-08-10 | 171,400,000 | 4:59 | 34,400,000 |
| All the Light We Cannot See: Limited Series | 2023-11-02 | 129,900,000 | 3:50 | 33,900,000 |
| My Life With the Walter Boys: Season 1 | 2023-12-07 | 254,300,000 | 7:37 | 33,400,000 |
| King the Land: Limited | 2023-06-17 | 630,200,000 | 19:00 | 33,200,000 |
| Squid Game: The Challenge: Season 1 | 2023-11-22 | 270,600,000 | 8:10 | 33,100,000 |
And these are the top 15 films on Netflix for the second half of 2023:
| Title | Release Date | Total Hours Viewed | Total Runtime (Hours) | No. of Views |
| Leave the World Behind | 2023-12-08 | 286,300,000 | 2:22 | 121,000,000 |
| Heart of Stone | 2023-08-11 | 228,400,000 | 2:05 | 109,600,000 |
| Leo | 2023-11-21 | 171,200,000 | 1:47 | 96,000,000 |
| Nowhere | 2023-09-29 | 156,600,000 | 1:49 | 86,200,000 |
| The Out-Laws | 2023-07-07 | 135,500,000 | 1:37 | 83,800,000 |
| Hidden Strike | 125,900,000 | 1:43 | 73,300,000 | |
| Reptile | 2023-09-29 | 165,600,000 | 2:16 | 73,100,000 |
| The Killer | 2023-11-10 | 135,600,000 | 2:00 | 67,800,000 |
| Family Switch | 2023-11-30 | 109,400,000 | 1:46 | 61,900,000 |
| The Boss Baby | 100,700,000 | 1:38 | 61,700,000 | |
| You Are So Not Invited to My Bat Mitzvah | 2023-08-25 | 105,100,000 | 1:44 | 60,600,000 |
| Paw Patrol: The Movie | 84,500,000 | 1:26 | 59,000,000 | |
| Rebel Moon — Part One: A Child of Fire | 2023-12-21 | 131,100,000 | 2:16 | 57,800,000 |
| Extraction 2 | 2023-06-16 | 111,900,000 | 2:04 | 54,100,000 |
| Love at First Sight | 2023-09-15 | 78,800,000 | 1:31 | 52,000,000 |
| Miraculous: Ladybug & Cat Noir, The Movie | 2023-07-28 | 84,500,000 | 1:42 | 49,700,000 |