Watching all the films in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in order from start to finish is not an adventure to embark on lightly.
We’re now 14 years and 34 films into the whole sprawling saga. That means 6076 minutes – about 101 hours and 25 minutes – of movie-watching. For a bit of appropriately spacey context, that’s only about 20 minutes less than it took Apollo 11 to travel 250,000 miles from Earth to the moon. It is long.
And before you set out to watch the whole thing top to tail, you need to work out exactly what order you’re going to watch them in. You’re only likely to do this once, but there are a few ways to go about it.
Every Marvel film in order
Most obviously, you could watch them in the order they arrived in cinemas. The first three phases of the MCU introduced the Avengers gang and launched them into the Infinity Saga, and this way you’ll pick up all the nods, references and callbacks as they link through the series.
Phase One
Iron Man (May 2008)
The Incredible Hulk (June 2008)
Iron Man 2 (May 2010)
Thor (May 2011)
Captain America: The First Avenger (22 July 2011)
Avengers Assemble (4 May 2012)
Phase Two
Iron Man 3 (May 2013)
Thor: The Dark World (November 2013)
Captain America: The Winter Soldier (April 2014)
Guardians of the Galaxy (August 2014)
Avengers: Age of Ultron (May 2015)
Ant-Man (July 2015)
Phase Three
Captain America: Civil War (May 2016)
Doctor Strange (November 2016)
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (May 2017)
Spider-Man: Homecoming (July 2017)
Thor: Ragnarok (November 2017)
Black Panther (February 2018)
Avengers: Infinity War (April 2018)
Ant-Man and the Wasp (July 2018)
Captain Marvel (March 2019)
Avengers: Endgame (April 2019)
Spider-Man: Far From Home (July 2019)
Then came the start of the The Multiverse Saga, which we’re currently knee-deep in.
Phase Four
Black Widow (9 July 2021)
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (3 September 2021)
Eternals (5 November 2021)
Spider-Man: No Way Home (17 December 2021)
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (5 May 2022)
Thor: Love and Thunder (8 July 2022)
That’s the beginner’s route. Any idiot can watch stuff in the order it originally came out. Snoooooooze. Switch things up to hard mode by watching the films in the order that they happen in the Marvel universe itself, starting with skinny sad sack Steve Rogers getting absolutely tanked and sorting out World War Two.
Marvel films in chronological order
Captain America: The First Avenger
Captain Marvel
Iron Man
Iron Man 2
The Incredible Hulk
Thor
The Avengers
Iron Man 3
Thor: The Dark World
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy 2
Avengers: Age of Ultron
Ant-Man
Captain America: Civil War
Black Widow
Spider-Man: Homecoming
Doctor Strange
Black Panther
Thor: Ragnarok
Avengers: Infinity War
Ant-Man and the Wasp
Avengers: Endgame
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
Spider-Man: Far From Home
Eternals (apart from the bits set millions of years ago obviously)
Spider-Man: No Way Home
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Thor: Love and Thunder
That’s a fairly hefty to-watch list to be getting on with. HOWEVER.
There’s a full-fat version, which includes the accompanying TV shows. God knows how many minutes this full list runs to, but the Apollo 11 lads would be getting on for Jupiter by the time the credits roll on.
How to watch every Marvel film and TV series in order
Captain America: The First Avenger
Agent Carter (Marvel One-Shot)
Agent Carter season 1
Agent Carter season 2
Captain Marvel
Iron Man
The Incredible Hulk
Iron Man 2
The Consultant (Marvel One-Shot)
A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to Thor’s Hammer (Marvel One-Shot)
Thor
Avengers
Item 47 (Marvel One-Shot)
Iron Man 3
All Hail the King (Marvel One-Shot)
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 1, episodes 1 to 7
Thor: The Dark World
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 1, episodes 8 to 16
Captain America: The Winter Soldier
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 1, episodes 17 to 22
Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
Daredevil season 1
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 2, episodes 1 to 19
Jessica Jones season 1
Avengers: Age of Ultron
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 2, episodes 20 to 22
Daredevil season 2
Luke Cage season 1
Ant-Man
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 3, episodes 1 to 14
Cloak and Dagger season 1
Iron Fist season 1
Cloak and Dagger season 2
The Defenders season 1
Runaways season 1
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 3, episodes 15 to 19
The Punisher season 1
Captain America: Civil War
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 3, episodes 20 to 22
Black Panther
Black Widow
Runaways season 2
Inhumans season 1
Jessica Jones season 2
Runaways season 3
Spider-Man: Homecoming
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D.: Slingshot season 1
Luke Cage season 2
Doctor Strange
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4, episodes 1 to 8
Iron Fist season 2
Daredevil season 3
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 4, episodes 9 to 22
The Punisher season 2
Jessica Jones season 3
Thor: Ragnarok
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 5, episodes 1 to 19
Ant-Man and the Wasp
Avengers: Infinity War
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 5, episodes 20 to 22
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 6
Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. season 7
Avengers: Endgame
WandaVision season 1
The Falcon and the Winter Soldier season 1
Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
Spider-Man: Far From Home
Eternals
Spider-Man: No Way Home
Hawkeye
What If…? (alternate timelines)
Loki (alternate timeline)
Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
Moon Knight
Ms. Marvel
Thor: Love and Thunder
And then, of course, there’s more to come. Of course there is. There will always be more to come. We will never not be watching a Marvel film, perhaps for the rest of recorded history. After the Black Panther sequel, we’re into Phase Five, and Fantastic Four marks the start of Phase Six.
Every upcoming Marvel film
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (November 2022)
Ant-Man: Quantumania (February 2023)
Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (May 2023)
The Marvels (July 2023)
Blade (November 2023)
Captain America: New World Order (May 2024)
Thunderbolts (July 2024)
Fantastic Four (November 2024)
Avengers: The Kang Dynasty (May 2025)
Avengers: Secret Wars (November 2025)
