Stranger Things 4 is demolishing Netflix records – but can it eclipse Squid Game?

Stranger Things season 4 has officially entered the Netflix billionaire’s club.

Following the release of season 4's final two episodes on July 1, the latest entry in the Duffer Brothers' acclaimed sci-fi show has become the biggest English-language Netflix series of all time and the first to rack up over one billion viewing hours in its first 28 days of release.

As per the streamer's most recent popularity rankings (opens in new tab) , Stranger Things season 4 accrued almost twice as big an audience as the second-most popular English-language Netflix series, Bridgerton season 2 (which earned 656 million viewing hours in its opening month), and has so far registered around half a billion more viewing hours than Stranger Things season 3 managed in the same period.

Stranger Things season 4 is now second only to Squid Game on the list of the streamer's most popular TV series, period, and although episodes 1-7 will no longer count towards the show's running total, episodes 8 and 9 still have the power to dethrone Hwang Dong-hyuk’s dystopian survival drama if they continue to rake in the viewers.

At the time of writing, Stranger Things season 4 has racked up an almighty 1.15 billion first-month viewing hours – but Squid Game achieved an even more eye-watering 1.65 billion figure (for perspective, that means audiences spent more than 182,000 cumulative years watching the show in its first four weeks of release).

Can Stranger Things really dethrone Squid Game?

As mentioned, Stranger Things season 4 volume 2 will continue to grow the season's total first-month viewing figures until its 28-day release window elapses on July 28. To eclipse Squid Game, episodes 8 and 9 will need to generate almost exactly 500 million more viewing hours in just over four weeks.

That's certainly a tall order for the Hawkins gang – but not an impossible one. Stranger Things season 4 volume 2 has time on its side; episodes 8 and 9 boast a combined runtime of approximately four hours, which means that, by our amateur calculations, around 125 million more people will need to tune in to – or rewatch – the season finale (you know what to do, Eddie Munson fans).

Whether Stranger Things season 4 manages the feat or not – for what it's worth, this writer is betting on the enduring dominance of Squid Game – the success of the latest entry in the Duffer Brothers' beloved sci-fi series will come as a welcome reprieve for Netflix, which has endured a rocky 2022 amid subscribers losses and mass show cancelations .

Season 4's handsome viewing figures also bode well for Stranger Things season 5, which will mark the show's last mainline outing. Rumors have suggested that the Stranger Things universe could continue in future feature films and spin-off shows, but no upcoming projects have been confirmed as yet.