In 2021, Criminal Minds was the most-watched show on Netflix in the United States. Given that the show is impending to be removed from Netflix at this point, it may come as a surprise that it took home the title. We’ll examine where Criminal Minds will go on Netflix in the future, how many seasons are available where it’s streaming, and why seasons 13, 14, and 15 aren’t available there.
The police drama franchise is one of CBS’ most popular. The program aired for more than 324 episodes over 15 seasons on American television before gaining a following with streaming services.
How many seasons of Criminal Minds are on Netflix?
The rights to Criminal Minds are a bit of a headache, which is why the show’s streaming environment is as it is. CBS Television Distribution owns the copyright in the United States, whereas Disney has them outside of the country (more on this in a minute).
Netflix has rights to seasons 1 to 12 of Criminal Minds in the United States as of January 2022. It does not have access to either Criminal Minds: Suspect Behaviour or Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders, which are both still unavailable on an SVOD service in the United States.
Why Criminal Minds isn’t on Netflix outside of the United States
Outside of the United States, the program is exclusively available on Disney. Netflix has never distributed Criminal Minds internationally, although it’s where to go now that there’s a Star tab on Disney+.
Not only is the entire 15-season Disney+ series accessible, but so are its two spin-offs Suspect Behavior and Beyond Borders.
Will Seasons 13-15 of Criminal Minds ever be on Netflix?
Season 13 aired between September 2017 and April 2018 but was never available on Netflix. In its stead, Hulu (who holds seasons 13 through 15) and Paramount+ have released new seasons (which is the case until 2021).
Given that we’re now four years removed, it’s unlikely the newer seasons will ever be available on Netflix. Despite not having the complete library, it outperforms CoComelon and Grey’s Anatomy in terms of popularity. The Criminal Mindssters aren’t the only ones who have suffered an hiatus – NCIS also did. It was a major title for Netflix in 2021, ranking fourth among Netflix’s acquired titles in 2021 with 500 episodes.
Will Criminal Minds leave Netflix in 2022?
We initially thought we’d see the series conclude in 2020, but that didn’t happen. The chance is that Criminal Minds and NCIS will eventually be removed from Netflix to make room for Paramount+’s staple.
For the time being, despite the fact that we don’t yet have evidence to support it, it appears that using Netflix (which ViacomCBS has successfully done with shows like iCarly) is enticing viewers to migrate over to Paramount+.
The streaming rights will most certainly come up for renewal, and Netflix is expected to lose them. When that happens might be months or years away. We simply don’t know when it will happen.