The Best 90s TV Shows, Ranked
Rank the best 90s TV shows head-to-head, Friends vs Seinfeld and The X-Files vs Buffy, then see which 90s show the community ranks number one. Early results (n = 15): too few finished brackets to call a leader yet. Your first pick is right here. No sign-up.
Size
Will & Grace1998-2006
Frasier1993-2004
Tap a poster to make your pick. Crowd numbers appear after you choose.
90s TV Shows: early results
Early results (n = 15). Win rate across 313 head-to-head picks from 15 finished brackets. n is the number of matchups behind each win rate; only entrants with 30 or more are listed.
| # | 90s TV show | W–L | Win rate | vs .500 | Titles | n |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | The Sopranos1999-2007 | 33–11 | 75% | 4 | 44 | |
| 2 | Seinfeld1989-1998 | 29–11 | 72.5% | 2 | 40 | |
| 3 | Friends1994-2004 | 21–12 | 63.6% | 3 | 33 | |
| 4 | Buffy the Vampire Slayer1997-2003 | 21–13 | 61.8% | 1 | 34 | |
| 5 | Twin Peaks1990-1991 | 18–12 | 60% | 2 | 30 | |
| 6 | South Park1997-present | 18–13 | 58.1% | 1 | 31 | |
| 7 | The Simpsons1989-present | 16–14 | 53.3% | 0 | 30 |
90s TV Shows: an early tier list
Early results (n = 15) 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
- Nobody yet
Atier, win rate 60% or more
- The Sopranos
- Seinfeld
- Friends
Btier, win rate 50% or more
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer
- Twin Peaks
- The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air
- South Park
- The Nanny
- The Simpsons
- Saved by the Bell
Ctier, win rate 40% or more
- The West Wing
- Everybody Loves Raymond
- Full House
- The X-Files
- Boy Meets World
- Oz
- That '70s Show
- Frasier
- + 1 more
Dtier, win rate 25% or more
- Law & Order
- ER
- Sex and the City
- Dawson's Creek
- Will & Grace
Ftier, win rate 0% or more
- Nobody yet
How the 90s TV Shows bracket works
This 90s TV show ranking is played, not dragged into rows. You get one matchup at a time — Friends or Seinfeld? The Sopranos or The X-Files? — and after 15 picks the bracket has a champion, with everything else placed by how far it got. By the end you have ranked the 16 in today's draw without ever looking at more than two at a time; play All 24 for the whole field.
This bracket runs 4 rounds at the default 16-slot size (Round of 16, Quarterfinals, Semifinals, Final), drawn from a pool of 24 shows. Everyone gets the same draw on a given day, so you can compare runs with friends; New draw gives you a genuinely different bracket rather than the same path twice. 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 Friends, Seinfeld, The Sopranos and The X-Files. Updated
- Friends1994-2004
- Seinfeld1989-1998
- The Sopranos1999-2007
- The X-Files1993-2002
- Buffy the Vampire Slayer1997-2003
- The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air1990-1996
- The Simpsons1989-present
- Twin Peaks1990-1991
- South Park1997-present
- Law & Order1990-present
- ER1994-2009
- Frasier1993-2004
- Boy Meets World1993-2000
- Saved by the Bell1989-1993
- Dawson's Creek1998-2003
- That '70s Show1998-2006
- Will & Grace1998-2006
- The Nanny1993-1999
- Home Improvement1991-1999
- Full House1987-1995
- Everybody Loves Raymond1996-2005
- The West Wing1999-2006
- Oz1997-2003
- Sex and the City1998-2004
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 90s 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.
- If a matchup genuinely splits you, undo and replay it — a coin-flip pick in round one distorts everything below it.
Questions people ask
How many shows are in the 90s 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?
Friends, Seinfeld, The Sopranos, The X-Files, Buffy the Vampire Slayer, The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air, The Simpsons, Twin Peaks, South Park, Law & Order, ER and Frasier, plus 12 more. Every entrant is listed further down this page with its artwork.
How long does the 90s 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 90s 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.