The Best 2000s TV Shows, Ranked
Rank the best TV shows of the 2000s head-to-head, The Office vs Lost and The Wire vs Breaking Bad, then compare your list with the community. Early results (n = 22): too few finished brackets to call a leader yet. Your first pick is right here. No sign-up.
Size
Grey's Anatomy2005-present
How I Met Your Mother2005-2014
Tap a poster to make your pick. Crowd numbers appear after you choose.
2000s TV Shows: early results
Early results (n = 22). Win rate across 458 head-to-head picks from 22 finished brackets. n is the number of matchups behind each win rate; only entrants with 30 or more are listed.
| # | 2000s TV show | W–L | Win rate | vs .500 | Titles | n |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Breaking Bad2008-2013 | 49–13 | 79% | 4 | 62 | |
| 2 | The Office2005-2013 | 42–17 | 71.2% | 2 | 59 | |
| 3 | It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia2005-present | 32–17 | 65.3% | 3 | 49 | |
| 4 | The Wire2002-2008 | 31–18 | 63.3% | 3 | 49 | |
| 5 | Mad Men2007-2015 | 29–18 | 61.7% | 1 | 47 | |
| 6 | Dexter2006-2013 | 19–15 | 55.9% | 1 | 34 | |
| 7 | Prison Break2005-2017 | 22–18 | 55% | 2 | 40 | |
| 8 | How I Met Your Mother2005-2014 | 24–20 | 54.5% | 1 | 44 |
2000s TV Shows: an early tier list
Early results (n = 22) Too few finished brackets to call yet; the tiers settle as more people play. Placed by win rate, steadied toward 50% for entrants with few matchups: S is 75% or more, A 60%, B 50%, C 40%, D 25%.
Stier, win rate 75% or more
- Breaking Bad
Atier, win rate 60% or more
- The Office
- It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia
- The Wire
Btier, win rate 50% or more
- Mad Men
- Dexter
- Prison Break
- How I Met Your Mother
- Lost
- Grey's Anatomy
- House
Ctier, win rate 40% or more
- Arrested Development
- 24
- Six Feet Under
- Battlestar Galactica
- Heroes
- Gossip Girl
Dtier, win rate 25% or more
- Scrubs
- Friday Night Lights
- Deadwood
- 30 Rock
- The O.C.
- Curb Your Enthusiasm
- The Shield
Ftier, win rate 0% or more
- Nobody yet
How the 2000s TV Shows bracket works
This 2000s TV show ranking is played, not dragged into rows. You get one matchup at a time — The Wire or Lost? The Office or Breaking Bad? — and after 15 picks the bracket has a champion, with everything else placed by how far it got. A straight list invites you to hedge. A matchup does not, and that is what makes the final 24-deep order worth screenshotting.
This bracket runs 4 rounds at the default 16-slot size (Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Final), drawn from a pool of 24 shows. The draw changes every day and New draw reshuffles it whenever you like, so the same show can meet a different opponent in round one and finish somewhere else entirely. You can also play it at 8 or 24 slots for a shorter or longer run.
15 picks, 4 rounds
- Round of 168 matchups
- Quarterfinals4 matchups
- Semifinals2 matchups
- Final1 matchup
Roughly 1-2 minutes start to finish at the default size.
All 24 entrants
All 24 entrants are listed below, including The Wire, Lost, The Office and Breaking Bad. Updated
- The Wire2002-2008
- Lost2004-2010
- The Office2005-2013
- Breaking Bad2008-2013
- Mad Men2007-2015
- Dexter2006-2013
- The Shield2002-2008
- Arrested Development2003-2006
- How I Met Your Mother2005-2014
- It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia2005-present
- Scrubs2001-2010
- 242001-2014
- House2004-2012
- Grey's Anatomy2005-present
- Six Feet Under2001-2005
- Curb Your Enthusiasm2000-2024
- Deadwood2004-2006
- Battlestar Galactica2004-2009
- 30 Rock2006-2013
- Friday Night Lights2006-2011
- The O.C.2003-2007
- Gossip Girl2007-2012
- Heroes2006-2010
- Prison Break2005-2017
Tier list instead?
Load all 24 into the tier list maker and sort them into S through F yourself: same entrants, no matchups.
Open the tier list makerMissing something?
Build your own 2000s TV show bracket with exactly the entrants you want, then share the link.
Open the bracket makerGetting a ranking you actually agree with
- Judge the whole run, not just the best season, or every prestige show wins by default.
- Start at 16 slots. If the result feels too obvious, replay at 24 so more of the 24 shows make the field.
- Undo exists for a reason: an early-round mistake propagates all the way to the final, and there is no shame in taking it back.
Questions people ask
How many shows are in the 2000s TV Shows bracket?
The pool holds 24 shows. A default run uses 16 of them and takes 15 picks across 4 rounds: Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Final. Other field sizes are available too — 8, 16, 24 slots.
Which shows are included?
The Wire, Lost, The Office, Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Dexter, The Shield, Arrested Development, How I Met Your Mother, It's Always Sunny in Philadelphia, Scrubs and 24, plus 12 more. Every entrant is listed further down this page with its artwork.
How long does the 2000s TV Shows bracket take?
About 1-2 minutes — 15 choices at the default size, or 7 if you drop to an 8-slot bracket. No account is needed, and a run saves after every pick, so you can stop and jump back in later.
Can I turn the result into S/A/B tiers?
Both are here, and the bracket is closer to a tier list than it looks. It ends with a champion, a runner-up and then every other show grouped by the round it went out in — which is exactly a set of tiers, decided by 15 direct comparisons rather than by your first guess at a layout. What it deliberately does not do is claim a precise gap between two shows that never met. If you would rather place the shows into S through F rows yourself, the tier list maker loads all 24 of them at bracketranker.com/tier-list-maker.
Can I compare my order with other people's?
Every completed bracket feeds the 2000s TV Shows community results page, which aggregates win rates across all plays and tracks how often each of the 24 entrants takes the title. It updates continuously, so it moves as more people play.
What if a show I wanted is missing?
Use the bracket maker: add your own shows, name it, and share the link so other people play the same field. That is the route to take when this pool of 24 is missing something you would have picked, or when you want a version scoped to one era, label or franchise.