Skip to main content

The 10 best comedy movies on Netflix

From Netflix originals to much older comedy classics, these are the best movies you can stream now on Netflix

woman and man sitting on couch watching tv
Image used with permission by copyright holder

Finding a great movie on Netflix is hard enough, but it can sometimes feel like finding the best comedy movies on Netflix is nearly impossible. While Netflix certainly makes plenty of comedies of all stripes to choose from, they’re often less than excellent. We’re not here to judge, of course, but if you’re looking for a comedy that has actual production value and some decent jokes, you may need to get just a little bit choosier. Thankfully, we’re around to help you find the best comedy movies that Netflix has to offer.

Of course, Netflix has great movies in a wide variety of other genres, including action, but this list will focus only on what they’ve got to offer in the way of comedy.

Related Guides

Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga (2020)

Eurovision Song Contest: The Story of Fire Saga
123m
Genre Comedy, Music
Stars Rachel McAdams, Will Ferrell, Pierce Brosnan
Directed by David Dobkin
The story of Fire Saga is absolutely absurd, but Will Ferrell and Rachel McAdams are so completely committed to their respective performances that they totally sell it. Eurovision tells the story of a pair of Icelandic performers who wind up in the Eurovision song contest and are forced to reckon with a modicum of success. What makes Eurovision so winning, though, is that it manages to be both silly and a little bit moving, thanks in large part to some stellar original songs. Eurovision may seem like any other comedy Netflix has put out in the last 10 years, but it’s one of their very best.
EUROVISION SONG CONTEST: The Story Of Fire Saga | Official Trailer | Netflix

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery (2022)

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery
140m
Genre Comedy, Crime, Mystery
Stars Daniel Craig, Edward Norton, Janelle Monáe
Directed by Rian Johnson

You may not immediately think of Rian Johnson’s Knives Out movies as comedies, but they undoubtedly are. Glass Onion has plenty of truly excellent one-liners, including at least a dozen from Daniel Craig’s Benoit Blanc, a character so big he wouldn’t fit into any genre besides comedy. It’s true, of course, that there’s also a mystery pulsing through the heart of Glass Onion. But beneath all of the curiosity around whodunnit, Glass Onion is really about how stupid the ultra-rich can be without anyone ever calling them on all of their crap.

Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery | Official Trailer | Netflix

Jerry Maguire (1996)

Jerry Maguire
138m
Genre Comedy, Drama, Romance
Stars Tom Cruise, Renée Zellweger, Cuba Gooding Jr.
Directed by Cameron Crowe

Tom Cruise is known today as the king of action, but Jerry Maguire is an outstanding reminder that Cruise can really do pretty much anything, even if that means playing a sports agent who grows a conscience and inadvertently throws his entire career away. Jerry Maguire is a sports movie, a romcom, and an outright comedy all rolled into one. There’s plenty of sincerity pulsing underneath the film, and it’s probably the most overtly sentimental movie on this list, but Cruise knows how to get a laugh. Best of all, Cuba Gooding Jr. matches him beat for beat.

JERRY MAGUIRE [1996] - Official Trailer (HD)

Notting Hill (1999)

Notting Hill
124m
Genre Romance, Comedy, Drama
Stars Julia Roberts, Hugh Grant, Gina McKee
Directed by Roger Michell

No romcom lead was ever more charming than Hugh Grant in his prime. Here, Grant stars opposite Julia Roberts in what may be the sweetest, funniest romcom either of them ever made. Roberts plays a genuine A-list movie star who somehow falls for Grant’s small bookstore owner. Grant is charmingly befuddled throughout, and the moments when Roberts’ characters meets and interacts with his friends are deeply endearing. It’s a movie that shouldn’t be nearly as sweet as it is, but it’s all carried off beautifully by the chemistry between its two central performers.

Notting Hill Official Trailer #1 - (1999) HD

To All the Boys I've Loved Before (2018)

To All the Boys I've Loved Before
100m
Genre Comedy, Romance
Stars Lana Condor, Noah Centineo, Janel Parrish
Directed by Susan Johnson

One of the Netflix original romcoms that rises above a lot of its peers, To All the Boys I’ve Loved Before has a pretty high-concept premise. Thanks to its charming leads and some genuinely beautiful shot compositions, it manages to feel much better than its peers. The story of a young romantic whose love letters are leaked to the men she wrote them about, the movie is really just another story about a fake relationship that turns into a real one. While that may not sound like stunning new ground, what elevates To All the Boys is the genuine chemistry its two leads share.

To All The Boys I've Loved Before | Official Trailer | Netflix

Sleepless in Seattle (1993)

Sleepless in Seattle
105m
Genre Comedy, Drama, Romance
Stars Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, Bill Pullman
Directed by Nora Ephron

A movie so daring it keeps its leads apart for almost the entire runtime, Sleepless in Seattle features Tom Hanks, Meg Ryan, and Nora Ephron all operating at the peak of their powers. Telling the story of a grieving father who connects with a potential love interest over the radio, the movie nonetheless gives Ryan and Hanks plenty of time to connect and to establish their own rich characters. There are plenty of jokes to be had here too, making this one of the more enduring romantic comedies ever made.

Sleepless in Seattle (1993) Trailer #1 | Movieclips Classic Trailers

The Mitchells vs. the Machines (2021)

The Mitchells vs. the Machines
81 %
7.6/10
pg 114m
Genre Animation, Adventure, Comedy, Family, Science Fiction, Action
Stars Abbi Jacobson, Danny McBride, Maya Rudolph
Directed by Michael Rianda

If you’re looking for a family comedy on Netflix, The Mitchells vs. the Machines is the movie to stream. The plot follows a quirky and dysfunctional family, and focuses on a father and his college-age daughter who just can’t find any way to connect. When the father (Danny McBride) decides to take a road trip to reconnect with his daughter (Abbi Jacobson), they find themselves stuck in a car together as the only humans who can stop a sudden robot apocalypse. If you’re a fan of animated series, this is a great film to enjoy with the whole family.

Monty Python and the Holy Grail (1975)

Monty Python and the Holy Grail
91 %
8.2/10
pg 91m
Genre Adventure, Comedy, Fantasy
Stars Graham Chapman, John Cleese, Eric Idle
Directed by Terry Gilliam, Terry Jones

This classic British comedy from Monty Python follows King Arthur (Graham Chapman) and his Knights of the Round Table as they embark on a low-budget and absolutely absurd search for the Holy Grail. This medieval group of soldiers encounters a plethora of silly obstacles in the quest for greatness, including an impressively persistent knight and — gulp — the French. You can try our movie drinking game if you’d like to add to your enjoyment of the film.

Dolemite Is My Name (2019)

Dolemite Is My Name
76 %
7.2/10
r 118m
Genre Drama, Comedy, History
Stars Eddie Murphy, Keegan-Michael Key, Mike Epps
Directed by Craig Brewer

This comedy follows Rudy Ray Moore (Eddie Murphy), a washed-up musician who transforms himself into a cult star. Dolemite Is My Name is unlike any Eddie Murphy movie you may have seen, but his top-notch performance will make you laugh — and maybe cry — in this top-notch dramedy.

Always Be My Maybe (2019)

Always Be My Maybe
64 %
6.8/10
pg-13 101m
Genre Romance, Comedy
Stars Ali Wong, Randall Park, Keanu Reeves
Directed by Nahnatchka Khan

If you’re looking for a good rom-com on Netflix, Always Be My Maybe is a great place to start. The story follows Sasha (Ali Wong) and Marcus (Randall Park), two people everyone assumed would end up together. After reconnecting after 15 years apart, they begin to think maybe they are meant to be after all. Also, Keanu Reeves shows up playing himself, and who can say no to a little more Keanu?

Editors' Recommendations

Movie images and data from:
Joe Allen
Contributor
Joe Allen is a freelance culture writer based in upstate New York. His work has been published in The Washington Post, The…
Love Dune 2? The best Denis Villeneuve movies, ranked
Dune: Part Two director Denis Villeneuve has had a very prolific career.
The official poster for Dune: Part Two.

Thanks to the box office success of Dune: Part Two, Denis Villeneuve is now firmly established among the top directors in Hollywood. It's an overnight success story that only took 26 years to come to fruition. And over the past decade, Villeneuve has taken it upon himself to make some of the best science fiction movies of the century. But Villeneuve has already proven that he can do a lot more than sci-fi.

To celebrate the director's films, we've narrowed them down to the 7 best Denis Villeneuve movies ranked from seventh to first. And there is no "worst" among these Denis Villeneuve movies.

Read more
Movie vs. book: Which is better? 6 adaptations taken to task
From The Shining to The Silence of the Lambs, we're looking at some iconic book-to-movie adaptations
The Shining movie still

Film adaptations of novels earn up to 53% more at the box office than original screenplays, according to Forbes. For whatever reason, moviegoers worldwide are more obsessed with books that get turned into movies, even over original cinematic creations. Even so, not all movies based on books are created equal (they're almost all better than your average video game movie, though). 

Although the novel and the feature-length film are starkly different artistic mediums, cinephiles have endless conversations about the successes or failures of certain adaptations. Snobs will resort to the conclusion that the book is always better, but is that really true?

Read more
If you love Masters of the Air, you need to watch this Apple TV+ documentary
Love Masters of the Air? Watch this documentary
Austin Butler and Callum Turner in Masters of the Air.

Much like the other World War II miniseries that Steven Spielberg and Tom Hanks have produced, Masters of the Air tells the true story of the 100th bomb group, who served in the Air Force during World War II. The series is set to debut its finale on Apple TV Plus on March 15, and now, we've learned that it will be accompanied by a documentary that tells the true story of the soldiers who are so central to the show.

The documentary, which is called The Bloody Hundredth, was produced by Spielberg's Amblin Entertainment and will be narrated by Tom Hanks.
“Directed by Mark Herzog and long-time Spielberg collaborator Laurent Bouzereau, the hour-long documentary spotlights the true stories of several characters and real-life airmen featured in “Masters of the Air” including John Egan (played by Callum Turner), Gale Cleven (played by Austin Butler), Harry Crosby (played by Anthony Boyle), Robert “Rosie” Rosenthal (played by Nate Mann), Frank Murphy (played by Jonas Moore), Alexander Jefferson (played by Brandon Cook), Richard Macon (played by Josiah Cross), as well as veterans John “Lucky” Luckadoo, Robert Wolf, and many others. From the shock of Pearl Harbor to the joy of VE Day, “The Bloody Hundredth” is a record of what was endured and achieved by a group of young Americans when their country and the world needed them most.”
The documentary is produced by Spielberg, Hanks and Gary Goetzman, and will likely be the perfect complement to Masters of the Air as the show wraps its run.

Read more