‘Leave the World Behind’ tops all Netflix viewing for second half of 2023

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, released Thursday, 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 and produced by Higher Ground, 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, generated 96 million views following its Nov. 11 release. “Nowhere,” Netflix’s third most popular non-English language film ever, garnered 86 million views.

Among TV series, “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).

In addition, according to Netflix’s analysis, reality competition spin-off “Squid Game: The Challenge” (33 million views in the second half of 2023) increased viewership for the original Korean series “Squid Game” by 34%, three years after the latter’s premiere.

Licensed titles also continued 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).

The full spreadsheet covering Netflix viewing from July-December 2023 — spanning 6,599 series seasons and 9,395 films — is available at this link. Other highlights from the report:

• Netflix’s three 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 98 million total views, “Red Notice” had 62 million and “Squid Game” had 25 million.
• The first three parts of Netflix’s “Lupin” generated nearly 100 million views in the second half of 2023, and there were nearly 200 million views across the eight seasons of the “CoComelon” kids show. Also popular (counting all seasons) were “The Witcher” (76 million), “Virgin River” (69 million), “The Crown” (50 million), “Sweet Magnolias” (35 million), “Top Boy” (26 million), “Heartstopper” (24 million), “Sintonia” (20 million) and “Sweet Home” (17 million).
• Non-English shows and movies make up nearly a third of all viewing on Netflix. Korean (9% of viewing), Spanish (7%) and Japanese (5%) language stories captured the biggest share of viewing outside of English. Standouts cited by Netflix include “Dear Child” (53 million views) from Germany, “Forgotten Love” (43 million) from Poland, “Pact of Silence” (21 million) from Mexico, “Mask Girl” (19 million) from Korea, “Yu Yu Hakusho” (17 million) from Japan, “Berlin” (11 million) from Spain, and “The Railway Men” (11 million) from India.
• Sports has become an increasingly popular category, amassing a combined 184 million views in the back half of 2023 including “Beckham” (44 million views), “Untold: Johnny Football” (14 million) and “Quarterback” (13 million).
• Kids and family represented 15% of all viewing, with titles like “Gabby’s Dollhouse” (90 million), “Family Switch” (62 million), and “The Monkey King” (43 million).

Variety