The Best Shows to Watch on a Rainy Sunday (When You Don't Want to Move)

If you only take one recommendation from this page, take this one: put on The Leftovers on HBO Max. It's the best show for a rainy Sunday that has ever been made, because it was designed by a man who clearly hated the sun. It runs three tight seasons, it looks like weather, and by episode three you'll forget what your name is, which on a gray Sunday is the whole point. Everything else below is real too. I'm ranking honestly. If a show is only for a specific kind of person, I'll tell you which kind.

The Leftovers (2014, 3 seasons, HBO Max) — the #1 pick

Start with S1E3 ("Two Boats and a Helicopter"). If Reverend Matt's episode doesn't hook you, the show isn't for you and that's fine. Season 1 is a slog on purpose; season 2 is one of the greatest seasons of television ever made; season 3 sticks the landing. If you liked Six Feet Under or you cry easily to a well-placed needle drop, yes. If you want plot answers wrapped in a bow, absolutely not — this show will hand you a Wikipedia page written in Portuguese. Time commitment: 28 episodes, about an hour each, roughly a moody two-week project or a demented one-weekend binge. Ended clean. Why it works today: Damon Lindelof made a show about grief that treats a rainy sky like a character, and Justin Theroux runs through more precipitation per capita than any actor since Gene Kelly. You will not feel better. You will feel seen, which on a rainy Sunday is better.

🏆 DROP EVERYTHING

Better Call Saul (2015, 6 seasons, Netflix) — the safest bet on the list

Start with S1E1 and don't let anyone tell you to skip ahead. The first two seasons are quiet and courtroom-shaped; that's the show. If you liked Breaking Bad but wished it slowed down and gave every side character a soul, this is for you. If you need something to happen in the first ten minutes of every episode, you'll bounce by episode four and blame me. Sixty-three episodes at 45 minutes. Ended, and the finale is one of the few in TV history that isn't a small betrayal. It works for a rainy day because it's paced like weather. Bob Odenkirk and Rhea Seehorn are doing acting the way it used to be done before every prestige show became a franchise wrapper. Sit down, don't check your phone.

🏆 DROP EVERYTHING

Mad Men (2007, 7 seasons, AMC+ / rotating) — the platonic Sunday show

Start with S1E1 ("Smoke Gets in Your Eyes"). The pilot is the pitch; if the last line doesn't move you, the show won't. If you liked The Sopranos or the idea of watching handsome miserable people drink from noon till whenever, yes. If you need action, no — nothing happens for large stretches, and that's the medicine. Ninety-two episodes, 45 minutes, a proper months-long relationship. Ended, sublimely. It fits a gray day because the whole show is set in a version of America where the office lights are always yellow and it's always drizzling in New York and someone is always about to ruin a marriage. Jon Hamm's face is a fireplace.

✅ WORTH IT

Fleabag (2016, 2 seasons, Prime Video) — the two-hour cry-laugh

Start with S1E1. No skipping. Twelve episodes at 25 minutes each; you can do the whole thing in an afternoon and still have time to stare at the ceiling. If you liked I May Destroy You or the concept of a show that talks directly to you without being smug about it, yes. If fourth-wall breaks make you itchy, no. Ended, and Phoebe Waller-Bridge had the discipline to leave. It's the perfect rainy Sunday show because it fits inside the storm. You start it when it starts raining; when the rain stops, so does the show, and you sit there for a minute trying to figure out what just happened to your chest. Watch Fleabag on Prime Video and consider it a public service.

🏆 DROP EVERYTHING

Slow Horses (2022, ongoing, Apple TV+) — the current one worth caring about

Start with S1E1. Six-episode seasons that fly. Five seasons out, a sixth ordered, based on Mick Herron's Slough House novels (the books on Amazon are also excellent and available if you finish and want more). If you liked Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy but wanted it funnier and more disgusting, yes. If you need espionage that flatters MI5, no; Gary Oldman plays Jackson Lamb like a man who has personally hurt every dry cleaner in London. Roughly six hours a season. It works today because the sky in every scene is doing exactly what the sky outside your window is doing, and each season resolves cleanly so you're not left dangling if you fall asleep at 4 p.m.

✅ WORTH IT

Detectorists (2014, 3 seasons + a special, Prime Video) — the sleeper

Start with S1E1. Twenty half-hour episodes, one Christmas special, a stack of hours you'll finish and immediately mourn. If you liked Schitt's Creek or the entire idea of British men in fields, yes. If you want a plot engine, absolutely not — the plot is that two guys wave metal detectors around and talk. Ended by choice, unblemished. Watch Detectorists on Prime Video. It works on a rainy Sunday because it lowers your heart rate by roughly 30 beats per minute. Mackenzie Crook wrote it, directed it, starred in it, and somehow produced the most soothing thing on television. Not one moment of this show is trying to sell you a mattress.

🏆 DROP EVERYTHING

Broadchurch (2013, 3 seasons, Prime Video) — the moody detective

Start with S1E1 and finish season 1 before you even think about the others. Season 2 is a divisive courtroom detour, season 3 is a return to form. If you liked Mare of Easttown, yes; that show borrowed its DNA from this one. If you can't handle a mystery about the death of a child, hard no — get out now. Twenty-four episodes, 45 minutes. Ended. It fits the mood because the whole show is set in a Dorset seaside town where it's always about to rain, and Olivia Colman is doing the kind of subtle work that makes American procedurals look like Ring cam footage. Grab Broadchurch on Prime Video, a blanket, and one strong feeling.

✅ WORTH IT

Halt and Catch Fire (2014, 4 seasons, AMC+) — the one nobody watched

Skip the pilot's hype and stick through S1E4. The first season is the show finding its legs; seasons 2 through 4 are a completely different, better show about four people building companies in the '80s and '90s tech boom. If you liked Mad Men but wanted engineers instead of ad guys, yes. If you can't stand a show that dares to care about its women characters more than its men, you'll be uncomfortable, which is your problem. Forty episodes. Ended. AMC let it live long enough to finish its own thought, which is a small miracle. On a rainy day it hits because the whole thing is about people trying to build something that will outlast them while everything around them keeps changing. It'll make you want to call somebody.

✅ WORTH IT

Somebody Somewhere (2022, 3 seasons, HBO Max) — the quiet one

Start with S1E1. Twenty-one episodes at 30 minutes. Bridget Everett stars as a woman in Manhattan, Kansas trying to build a life that fits her. If you liked Enlightened or Reservation Dogs, yes. If you want jokes with punchlines, no; this is a show where the jokes are the fact that the people are real. Ended after season 3 because HBO didn't renew it, which is its own kind of crime, but the ending works. It's the best rainy day show on HBO Max because nothing bad really happens and yet everything moves. Small stakes. Big hearts. The choir scene alone justifies the subscription.

✅ WORTH IT

The Terror: Season 1 (2018, 1 season anthology, AMC+ / Hulu with add-on) — the off-menu order

Start with S1E1 and only watch season 1. Season 2 is a different story, fine, not the reason you're here. Ten episodes at an hour. Based on Dan Simmons's novel (the book on Amazon), a fictionalized account of the doomed Franklin Expedition in the Arctic. If you liked Chernobyl, yes. If "men trapped in ice slowly losing their minds" isn't a mood, absolutely no. It's finished as an arc. It works on a rainy day because it makes rain look like a spa day. Jared Harris and Ciarán Hinds do the kind of quiet devastation you don't see on network TV anymore.

✅ WORTH IT

Fargo (2014, ongoing anthology, Hulu) — the pick-any-season buffet

Start with S1E1, or if you've seen it, start Season 5 ("Bear Trap" is the pilot). Each season is standalone; you can jump in wherever. Five seasons out, a sixth on the way. If you liked the Coen Brothers movie or Justified, yes. If violence played for absurd comedy makes you uneasy, no. Sixty episodes across the whole run, 50 minutes each. It works because every season is a self-contained snow globe of a show, and on a rainy Sunday a snowy show is even better — cross-weather solidarity. Season 5 with Juno Temple and Jon Hamm is the recent one that actually lived up to the earlier peaks.

✅ WORTH IT

The Great British Bake Off (2010, ongoing, Netflix) — the reliable background comfort

Start with any season featuring Mary Berry as judge, so S1–S7. The Prue Leith era is fine, the Mary years are the drug. If you want plot, no. If you want a lightly stressed British person icing a cake for 45 minutes while a soft-voiced woman named Sandi tells jokes, yes. Ongoing. Roughly ten episodes per season, an hour each. It's on this list for one specific mood: you want the TV on, you want to feel like a person, and you don't want to commit anything above 4% of your brain. Perfect fold-laundry television. The stakes are literally cake. Start a Prime Video free trial if you want the Prime picks above and this at the same time.

🛋️ BACKGROUND TV

What to skip on a rainy Sunday

Anything with a runtime under 20 minutes and a laugh track. Anything Netflix is calling "a limited event." The eighth season of a show you gave up on in the fifth. Any true crime documentary that's really a nine-hour episode of Dateline with a synth score. Anything where the trailer used the word "reimagined." You know what you're doing, don't let the algorithm bully you.

FAQ

What's the best show to watch on a rainy Sunday if I'm hungover?

Detectorists. It's quiet, it's short, the light is soft, and nobody yells. If you're too fragile for reading subtitles, put on The Great British Bake Off and let Mary Berry parent you.

What's the best rainy Sunday show if I just got dumped?

Fleabag if you want to feel it, The Leftovers if you want to feel it worse and come out the other side. Do not, under any circumstances, put on Normal People unless you enjoy self-harm.

Is there a good rainy Sunday show that's actually funny?

Detectorists and Somebody Somewhere. Both are quiet-funny, the kind where you laugh and then don't say anything for a minute. If you need harder laughs, Fargo Season 2 is bleak and comic in equal measure.

What's a rainy Sunday show I can start and finish today?

Fleabag. Twelve episodes at 25 minutes each is about five hours. Start at noon, finish by early evening, take an hour to recover, and go to bed like you accomplished something.

What to watch tonight

Pour something warm, put your phone in a different room, and start The Leftovers Season 1, Episode 3. If you already know that show, put on Detectorists Season 1, Episode 1 and let the rain do what it's here to do.

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