How to watch the Marvel movies in order | TechRadar

The continual growth of the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) is starting to become a problem. Why? Because it's getting harder to work out how to watch the Marvel movies in order.

That's largely down the time jumps and confusing MCU timeline post-Avengers: Endgame, though. Up until Marvel's Phase 4 slate, watching the Marvel movies in order was pretty easy. However, the arrival of the Black Widow solo movie, whose story is actually part of Marvel's Phase 3 film line-up, muddied the waters somewhat. Since then, the arrival of Shang-Chi, Eternals, and Spider-Man: No Way Home have only compounded the issue.

But fear not, dear reader. With our expert help, you won't have to worry about how to watch every MCU movie in order any longer. Below, you'll find out how to watch the Marvel movies in chronological order – that being where each one fits in the MCU's timeline based on the year that they're set. We've also revealed how to watch the Marvel movies in release order, too, starting with 2008's Iron Man and ending with No Way Home.

With Marvel Studios' expansion into the TV realm with its MCU Disney Plus shows, we've included where WandaVision, Hawkeye and more fit in each order as well.

Stream Marvel movies and TV on Disney PlusEvery MCU movie (apart from The Incredible Hulk and Tom Holland's Spider-Man films) is available to stream on Disney Plus, which costs only $7.99 a month in the US (£7.99 in the UK/AU$11.99 in Australia). You can also buy an annual subscription for a discounted $79.99 (£79.90/AU$119.99). If your country's Disney Plus price isn't listed here, check out our subscription cost guide.

Marvel movies in chronological orderMarvel movies in release orderMarvel movies on Disney PlusBest Marvel movies

With plenty of MCU content on the way in 2022, this guide is going to get more complicated. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness releases in early May, Thor: Love and Thunder will arrive in July, and Black Panther 2: Wakanda Forever is coming in November. Ms. Marvel, She-Hulk, Moon Knight, Secret Invasion and a Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special will also wing their way to Disney Plus.

However you decide to watch the Marvel movies in order, you're in for a fun journey through some of the best superhero movies of all-time. Suit up and let's find out how to watch the Marvel movies in order together.

Marvel movies in order: chronological

How to watch the Marvel movies in chronological order

Let's start with the MCU's chronological order. This means you'll be watching the 27 Marvel movies in order by the year that they're set in. So you'll be starting with Captain America's origin story in WWII and end with Spider-Man: No Way Home.

Eternals makes things trickier as there are flashbacks to time periods that precede Captain America's creation. But, to prevent any major confusion about where Eternals should be placed, we've slotted it in at the end of our list, just before Spider-Man: No Way Home.

This is how you'll want to watch the Marvel movies in order if you're a continuity buff. We've also listed the MCU shows order below, so you can see how they fit around the movies. Here's how to watch the Marvel movies in chronological order:

Some timings are ambiguous – for example, Black Widow, Spider-Man: Homecoming, Black Panther and Doctor Strange all occur at roughly the same time. They're also set across varying lengths of time, which makes it difficult to place them in a specific year. So we've done our best with the knowledge that we have.

Now for the order of the Marvel TV shows. WandaVision takes place a few weeks after Endgame. Meanwhile, The Falcon and the Winter Soldier is set six months after Endgame – so both shows take place before Spider-Man: Far From Home. Loki, meanwhile, is technically set after the events of The Avengers, but in an alternate timeline – so we'd advise watching it after Avengers: Endgame.

The MCU's first animated series – What If...? – is like Loki. It's set in the wider multiverse, so it plays out around events that we've seen on the big and small screens. Finally, Hawkeye's solo adventure (well, paired adventure with Kate Bishop) is set a year post-Endgame, which means it takes place around the 2023 Holiday season.

Marvel movies in order: release date

How to watch the Marvel movies in release date order

Do you want to know how to watch the Marvel movies in release order? Try this list instead.

This is how Marvel Studios intended you to see the story play out. And you'll get to enjoy how the movies got bigger and better over the years – especially after Disney bought Marvel Studios and started pumping up the budgets.

Below, you'll learn how to watch the Marvel movies in order that they were released. That starts with Iron Man in 2008 and ends with Spider-Man: No Way Home, which launched in December 2021.

Phase 1

Phase 2

Phase 3

Phase 4

Marvel Phase 4 movies and shows

Upcoming Marvel movies and TV shows: Phase 4 and beyond release dates

Marvel movies on Disney Plus

How to watch the Marvel movies on Disney Plus

Wondering how to watch the Marvel movies on Disney Plus? The Incredible Hulk and Tom Holland's Spider-Man trilogy are the only MCU films that aren't on Disney Plus, and that's because Universal and Sony own the distribution rights to them respectively. You'll have to buy or rent them on DVD, Blu-Ray, or digital if you want tobinge watch every Marvel film.

These are the Marvel movies on Disney Plus in the US, UK and Australia:

And these are the Marvel TV shows available on Disney Plus:

Marvel movies ranked

Marvel movies: ranked from best to worst

What are the best Marvel movies? For us, the Avengers movies mark the peak of the MCU, but the whole thing is subjective.

Below, we've ranked the Marvel movies based on user scores from IMDb. The peoples' votes are pretty expected for some films (Thor: The Dark World and The Incredible Hulk are no one's favorite Marvel films), but others, not so much in our view (everyone thinks that Ant-Man and the Wasp isn't as good as Captain America: The First Avenger, right?).

Spider-Man: No Way Home is currently ranked as the best MCU movie ever. That's been changing over time, though – it originally had a 9.2 rating, but that's fallen to 8.7 since its initial release. So expect No Way Home to continue tailing off in the future.

How to download Marvel movies

How to download every MCU movie

If you want to download Marvel movies for watching on the go, you can save offline copies via the Disney Plus app on your portable device (smartphone or tablet). But you can't do this on a desktop PC or laptop.

You'll need enough storage space, but just look for the download symbol on any title in the Disney Plus app:

Downloaded content on your phone will stay in your device's main memory if it doesn’t have an external microSD card slot. That includes all Apple iPhone smartphones, iPad tablets, and a few others handsets (like the Google Pixel 3a).

A 1-hour download takes about 400MB of storage depending on your download quality. Meanwhile, high quality is six times better than standard quality, and medium is 50% better than standard quality (which is the Disney Plus app’s default).

If you're happy to buy the movies, too, say through Amazon Prime, that'll also allow you to download Marvel movies locally.