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Exclusive: Asian series dominate Netflix’s 2025 global non-English TV top 10
29 November 2025
Asian series topped viewing hours on Netflix’s global non-English TV rankings for the year to 16 November, taking about 60% of the more than 10 billion hours spent viewing top 10 non-English programmes around the world.
Audiences around the world watched more than 6.3 billion hours of Asian series on Netflix’s non-English top 10 rankings for the year to mid-November. This represents about 60% of the total 10.3 billion hours that viewers around the world spent watching non-English-language top 10 shows, according to our analysis of Netflix’s published weekly rankings from 30 December 2024 to 16 November 2025.
Squid Game drove the year’s biggest viewing weeks for Asia, but consistent performance by Korean series as a whole put Asia well ahead of Europe, which came in at an average weekly share of 24%.
Japan, with its powerful anime presence, was second to Korea. Indian and Thai titles popped up here and there. These series included Thai blockbuster Mad Unicorn. Indian series included The Royals, Dabba Cartel, and Khakee: The Bengal Chapter season three.
Asia’s average weekly share of viewing hours for the year to mid-November was 57%, with a weekly high of 91% for the first week of the year when Squid Game seasons one and two topped the chart at a combined 530 million hours viewed.
Squid Game season two led the global charts with 417.1 million hours viewed in the week of 30 December 2024 to 5 January 2025. Season three followed with 368.4 million hours in the week of 23 June 2025 and 283.8 million hours the following week. These were the three highest weekly viewing totals recorded for any non-English series during the period tracked.
Other than Squid Game, the Korean shows that drove Asia’s global performance for the year included The Trauma Code: Heroes on Call season one, When Life Gives You Tangerines, Weak Hero: Class 1 and Class 2 and Bon Appétit, Your Majesty.
Other than live-action/manga-based Alice in Borderland, anime dominated global Japanese hits. Top shows included Dan da Dan, season one of The Fragrant Flower Blo...
Asian series topped viewing hours on Netflix’s global non-English TV rankings for the year to 16 November, taking about 60% of the more than 10 billion hours spent viewing top 10 non-English programmes around the world.
Audiences around the world watched more than 6.3 billion hours of Asian series on Netflix’s non-English top 10 rankings for the year to mid-November. This represents about 60% of the total 10.3 billion hours that viewers around the world spent watching non-English-language top 10 shows, according to our analysis of Netflix’s published weekly rankings from 30 December 2024 to 16 November 2025.
Squid Game drove the year’s biggest viewing weeks for Asia, but consistent performance by Korean series as a whole put Asia well ahead of Europe, which came in at an average weekly share of 24%.
Japan, with its powerful anime presence, was second to Korea. Indian and Thai titles popped up here and there. These series included Thai blockbuster Mad Unicorn. Indian series included The Royals, Dabba Cartel, and Khakee: The Bengal Chapter season three.
Asia’s average weekly share of viewing hours for the year to mid-November was 57%, with a weekly high of 91% for the first week of the year when Squid Game seasons one and two topped the chart at a combined 530 million hours viewed.
Squid Game season two led the global charts with 417.1 million hours viewed in the week of 30 December 2024 to 5 January 2025. Season three followed with 368.4 million hours in the week of 23 June 2025 and 283.8 million hours the following week. These were the three highest weekly viewing totals recorded for any non-English series during the period tracked.
Other than Squid Game, the Korean shows that drove Asia’s global performance for the year included The Trauma Code: Heroes on Call season one, When Life Gives You Tangerines, Weak Hero: Class 1 and Class 2 and Bon Appétit, Your Majesty.
Other than live-action/manga-based Alice in Borderland, anime dominated global Japanese hits. Top shows included Dan da Dan, season one of The Fragrant Flower Blooms With Dignity, and season three of One-Punch Man.
Netflix’s 2025 Japan ace may well be Last Samurai Standing. The series premiered at #2 on the global non-English top 10 for the week of 10-16 Nov with 31.7 million hours viewed. (Ed’s note: Data for the week of 17 November had not been released by the time this issue went to print. The full report will be available to ContentAsia subscribers in early 2026).
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