The 30 Finest Sitcoms Of All Time, Ranked

To rejoice an artform that continues to be an inexhaustible supply of pleasure after greater than 70 years of media omnipresence, we have regarded over the historical past of sitcoms and compiled a rating of the 30 biggest of all time — with rankings primarily based on a mix of sheer craftsmanship, affect and innovation, cultural iconicity, and, in fact, density of snickers.

To make our lives simpler, we adopted a number of floor guidelines: Straight, unambiguous sitcoms solely (so no sketch-only reveals and no dramedies, a lot as we love “Fleabag” and “Atlanta”); English-language solely (not as a result of non-English sitcoms cannot be unbelievable, however as a result of there are just too a lot of them to cowl with any equity); live-action solely. In any other case, all is honest sport right here, from the format-defining to the format-breaking to all the things in between.

Initially a spin-off of “All within the Household,” “The Jeffersons” was developed by Norman Lear (one of many biggest TV producers of all time) and ran on CBS like its father or mother present, however did not take lengthy to develop into totally its personal factor. Along with being one of many funniest, coziest, most definitional home sitcoms of all time, with Isabel Sanford and Sherman Hemsley as possibly the style’s funniest bickering married couple ever, it additionally had an inestimable constructive influence.

It was the primary time in American TV historical past, thoughts you, {that a} long-running sitcom was centered round an prosperous, profitable Black household. That representational breakthrough galvanized the nation within the ’70s and ’80s, providing an alternate portrait of the African American expertise that might later result in innumerous different landmark collection.

With its distinctive spin on the “associates dwelling collectively” sitcom format, NBC’s “The Golden Ladies” created one of the vital persistently entertaining households in TV historical past; simply watching Dorothy (Bea Arthur), Rose (Betty White), Blanche (Rue McClanahan), and Dorothy’s mom Sophia (Estelle Getty) sit collectively and commerce barbs was an immense pleasure week to week.

Including to that immeasurable hangout delight was the truth that “The Golden Ladies” was one of the vital sharply-written multi-camera sitcoms ever, with a mastery of setup-punchline joke construction that has seldom been touched. With expertly-calibrated dryness and snarkiness couched in real, heat curiosity in regards to the lives, ideas, and quandaries of the underrepresented demographic of girls over 60, it is no marvel that the present grew to become a large hit that also attracts new followers to today.

Perhaps essentially the most underrated collection on this checklist, Showtime’s “It is Garry Shandling’s Present” is the precursor to each cerebral, postmodernist, surreal, self-deconstructing Twenty first century sitcom. Though it started operating in 1986, at a time when most American tv comedy had settled right into a conformist, ratings-friendly sameness, it contains a premise so out-there that it prompts some shock even at present.

Garry Shandling, co-creator and star, performs Garry Shandling, a person conscious that he is the principle character in a sitcom, who always addresses the viewers as if his life had been a steady stand-up set, skewering and critiquing and overtly interfering with the inventory sitcom plotlines that information his life. Unbelievably conceptual and self-aware, the present was additionally gut-bustingly hilarious, with a messy, ramshackle perspective about itself that anticipated all the things from Grownup Swim to the mockumentary sitcoms of latest occasions.

“Blackadder” is such an eminent British cultural establishment that you would nearly let your self overlook it is also, earlier than anything, an exceptionally robust and hilarious sitcom. The BBC1 collection was a historic satire structured round a really daring idea: Every of the 4 seasons was set in a special historic interval, however with the principle actors — a veritable all-star crew of British comedy luminaries — taking part in the exact same characters in every season.

Whether or not skewering Fifteenth-century England, Queen Elizabeth I’s reign, the Regency, or the Western Entrance of World Struggle I, “Blackadder” married historic wit to a mastery of farce and goofy humor, ensuing within the kind of high-low masterpiece that makes British TV comedy so untouchable at its finest.

Created by Chris Rock and Ali LeRoi, with a primary season airing on UPN whereas the latter three moved over to The CW, “All people Hates Chris” used its autobiographical hook to spin hilarious, distinctive, incisive tales about rising up as a working-class Black teenager in Nineteen Eighties New York Metropolis.

Carried by Rock’s vigorous as-himself narration, and that includes Tyler James Williams in one of the vital achieved little one actor starring performances ever seen on the small display, the present loosely dramatized a few of Rock’s most memorable teenage adventures with a relentless, staunchly perceptive eye for the absurdities of ’80s-era American society — all rendered in a free-flowing, cartoony single-camera format that feels modern even at present. On the similar time, with assist from the sensible Terry Crews and Tichina Arnold-fronted ensemble, “All people Hates Chris” painted a tart but deeply loving household portrait.

Following up “Seinfeld” was arguably the toughest process ever confronted by a TV author, and it says one thing in regards to the brilliance of HBO’s “Curb Your Enthusiasm” that Larry David selected to strategy that problem by actively downplaying it.

Deceptively easy and unambitious in format and premise, with episodes following a fictionalized model of David wherever his creativeness would possibly take him from week to week, “Curb Your Enthusiasm” grew to become notable for its free, unscripted format, with conditions and storylines laid out beforehand and character interactions principally improvised by the actors. It was the proper setup for a present that endeavored nothing greater than to be deliriously hilarious and squirm-inducing week after week — a playground for the loopiest, silliest, most neurotic concepts of David, in addition to the varied big-name performers he invited into the present’s pitch-black showbiz satire.

Commonplace, gag-driven sitcoms usually are not essentially a spot the place narrative and philosophical grandiosity are anticipated, however the second that “The Good Place” laid out its jaw-dropping massive twist on the finish of Season 1, it was clear that the present’s ambitions had been a lot, a lot loftier than what we often affiliate with the style.

From there on out, the afterlife-set NBC comedy stored upping the ante, rewriting the rulebook for half-hour sitcoms by venturing into epic serialized fantasy storytelling, with fearless inquiries into all of the headiest existential themes: Morality, demise, id, the passage of time, the thriller of human connection, the necessities of constructing a greater world, the ever-pressing query of whether or not individuals can change. And it did all of it whereas providing a gentle inflow of TV’s silliest gags and goofiest jokes, with assist from a core six-person ensemble so flawless that to even title one particular MVP can be its personal philosophical conundrum.

A zany satire with extra of an grownup edge than most community TV, “WKRP in Cincinnati” was the primary American present to painting the day-to-day lifetime of radio disc jockeys precisely, due to creator Hugh Wilson’s firsthand expertise within the trade. In doing so, with its uncommon concentrate on lived-in, procedural office realism, this landmark CBS work-com laid the groundwork for a lot of of our time’s hottest reveals in that subgenre.

On the similar time, “WKRP” mastered the artwork of the ensemble sitcom, generously distributing materials to every member of its perfectly-balanced eight-person ensemble and ensuring that the station’s dynamic all the time stayed contemporary and interesting. It was a present to fall utterly in love with, which those that noticed it did; even because it struggled within the rankings and in the end acquired canned after simply 4 seasons, “WKRP” discovered a second life in syndication and in the end grew to become a TV cult traditional.

One of many quintessential Chicago reveals, CBS’s “Good Occasions” depicted life within the metropolis’s tasks with sobering readability but no scarcity of positivity and good-natured humor. If that’s the case many sitcoms and TV collection basically proceed to be pitched to a presumed middle-class suburban viewer for whom life within the margins is an summary idea, “Good Occasions” was a present about poverty that offered and grappled with poverty matter-of-factly, understanding that working-class individuals watch TV too.

It was one of the vital miraculous and best-executed balancing acts in tv historical past: A present about hardship, laced with biting wit and trademark Norman Lear social topicality (it was a spin-off of “Maude,” itself a spin-off of “All within the Household”), however one which mustered up a lot heat as to really feel like a comfortable place to land on the finish of a tough day — with the Evans because the sort of sitcom clan that will get to really feel like a second household.

The defining British sitcom of the Twenty first century, Channel 4’s “Peep Present” made waves with its modern POV taking pictures fashion, wherein nearly each shot was first-person, with these from the attitude of protagonists Mark (David Mitchell) and Jeremy (Robert Webb) additionally that includes narration of their ideas.

The brainy brainchild of Andrew O’Connor, Jesse Armstrong (who would later create HBO’s “Succession”), and Sam Bain, “Peep Present” married that dizzying formal innovation to loads of comedic and narrative boldness, utilizing the anxiety-ridden lives of two underachieving roommates as a testing floor of humanity’s capability for selfishness and delusion — and mining devilishly darkish humor from the large distances between individuals’s true and carried out selves.

A continuation of the eponymous, legendary radio collection that started operating in 1932, “The Jack Benny Program” was the grandfather of all sitcoms — and it laid the foundations for the style with out fairly inhabiting it formally. Outwardly, “The Jack Benny Program” was a sketch present, wherein the titular comic and his fellow stars would put collectively vigorous Hollywood parodies and musical numbers.

In between sketches, nonetheless, “The Jack Benny Program” additionally instructed the fictionalized story of its personal manufacturing, with the actors taking part in themselves as larger-than-life showbiz sorts with always clashing egos. This format allowed the present to not solely primarily inaugurate sitcoms as a TV style, however do it in a extra trendy, snarky, liberated means than “official” sitcoms would actually get to till a few years later. Speak about a trailblazer.

Few TV inner-worlds have ever been as totally, rigorously, fascinatingly developed because the fictional small city of Pawnee, Indiana on NBC’s “Parks and Recreation.” The care the writers took in constructing out the lore of Pawnee was equally mirrored in the best way they dealt with the present’s characters: Not many sitcoms have handled their gamers with extra love, so cherishing their improvement and capability for variation.

None of that might add as much as a lot, in fact, if “Parks and Recreation” weren’t humorous — and, to make sure, the present stayed hilarious and true to its strengths for the whole lot of its seven-season run. Bone-dry, rambunctiously foolish, and quietly sensible in regards to the maddening realities of small-town authorities, it was irresistible tv on each stage.

If the ’50s had been the time of genre-defining home CBS sitcoms like “I Love Lucy” and “The Honeymooners,” “The Dick Van Dyke Present” was the CBS collection that ushered within the ’60s, which is to say, arguably the primary trendy sitcom, and the primary to start out charting new territory.

Each a home sitcom a couple of suburban New York household and, revolutionarily, a office sitcom in regards to the manufacturing of a fictional selection TV present, this Carl Reiner-created collection moved away from the consolidated, gag- and pratfall-based codecs of ’50s sitcoms (although it nonetheless managed to get in essentially the most iconic televised tumble in historical past). As a replacement, “The Dick Van Dyke Present” introduced again the custom of screwball comedy, wringing enormously good and snappy humor out of fast-paced dialogue and, sometimes, TV-transformative risk-taking.

Lots of dramatic reveals in regards to the White Home have prided themselves of their accuracy, their sobriety, their stage of analysis, and even their cynicism. However no TV collection has fairly gotten proper how pathetic American politics are to the identical extent as HBO’s “Veep.”

Following the bumbling workers of a disgruntled U.S. vice-president (Julia Louis-Dreyfus), “Veep” was brutally cynical in its top-to-bottom evisceration of all the things from D.C. ceremonials to electoral dynamics to worldwide diplomacy to congressional energy performs. Each character was a petulant little one, an incompetent little one, or each. Each world-changing resolution was made within the pettiest phrases with the puniest intentions. Each rant was peppered with ranges of vulgarity and profanity that might kill a community Requirements and Practices officer on the spot. It was all as jaw-dropping because it was good, well-written, and hysterically humorous. To prime all of it off, Louis-Dreyfus gave the one biggest efficiency in TV comedy historical past.

With 4 seasons aired on ABC and one on NBC between 1978 and 1983, “Taxi” was the present that refined the work sitcom into the absolute best model of itself. For starters, each forged member was a grasp of their craft, from Judd Hirsch because the taciturn voice of purpose to Danny DeVito because the boisterous boss to Andy Kaufman because the intractable eccentric to Christopher Lloyd because the spaced-out former hippie. On prime of that, the present invented a number of sitcom conventions, and people it did not invent, it perfected.

Greater than something, although, “Taxi” was notable as a present in regards to the farcical nature of labor itself, the imbalances of sophistication relations and the chimeric absurdity of the American Dream. Made in a transformative interval for the American economic system, it understood what actually clear-eyed office comedy might be in a means that nearly no different U.S. present has, earlier than or since — such that the requisite Energy Of Friendship moments got here not in a vacuum however as a pointed rebuttal to a world wherein employee solidarity was being more and more discouraged.

It is sort of gorgeous to ponder the truth that one of the vital sensible and influential sitcoms of all time solely had 12 whole episodes, however there you’ve it: “Fawlty Towers” solely aired two seasons on BBC Two, one in 1975 one in 1979, earlier than passing on to the firmament of TV royalty.

That alone says quite a bit about how good these 12 episodes had been, particularly how utterly John Cleese and Connie Sales space perfected the artwork of constructing out farcical plots and peppering them with perfectly-constructed gags. A ruthless satire of ’70s British society and the classism, amorality, and normal dysfunction plaguing it, as manifested by way of the ins and outs of the world’s worst resort, “Fawlty Towers” was arguably the inaugural occasion of nice TV about horrible individuals — an idea it mastered proper out of the gate.

Showtime’s “It is At all times Sunny in Philadelphia” might nearly be described as extra of an experiment than a sitcom: What occurs in case you unleash 5 of the worst individuals on Earth on tv for 16 years, allow them to be totally and irrepressibly themselves with out ever studying a single factor, and mine each drop of darkish humor that comes from it?

The reply, in fact, is “one of the vital riotously humorous stuff you’ll ever watch.” Virtually non secular in its pure and unfettered human horror, but removed from only a present about horrible individuals, “At all times Sunny” has gone locations throughout its 16 seasons that the majority reveals would not even dare dream of, with the Gang’s deranged sociopathy proving as inexhaustible a comedic (and infrequently dramatic) engine as they arrive. The historical past of TV would not be the identical with out it.

In American leisure, household sitcoms have traditionally been synonymous with mild, escapist, rose-colored enjoyable. So there’s one thing amusing about the truth that the definitive household sitcom, the subgenre’s hottest and most influential instance ever, was a present outlined by its tonal, political, and narrative boldness.

Not that Norman Lear’s “All within the Household” lacked for escapist enjoyable, thoughts you — it was nonetheless a certifiable heat blanket of a present, more often than not. However, by way of its resolution to actively incorporate dramatic storytelling, political debate, hot-button social controversies, and lifelike working-class hardship, this CBS traditional confirmed that the household sitcom might flip a mirror to society — and that, as evidenced by its years of unchallenged rankings dominance, society simply would possibly find yourself enthralled somewhat than scared.

Though NBC’s “Pals” has develop into so overexposed, overanalyzed, and overdiscussed that it now counts about as many haters and skeptics because it does diehard followers, whenever you strip away all of the hype and all of the mythologizing, it is nonetheless simply an exceptionally good sitcom.

It was on no account good, if that is even achievable for a Nielsen-leading present with 10 seasons and 236 episodes/ “Pals” has its share of tough patches, maddening plotlines, horrible episodes, and poorly-aged jokes. However loving the present means taking the great with the dangerous, embracing the entire as an epic of aspirational camaraderie: A realm the place each heartache, each failure, each trendy flaw could possibly be sublimated into the nice and cozy, restorative glow of a bunch of fellow screw-ups who had one another’s backs it doesn’t matter what.

NBC’s “The Workplace” remains to be the best instance of a present that married the curt, awkward fashion of Twenty first-century comedy to punchy, jokey, mass-appeal sitcom orthodoxy.

Whereas it is broadly remembered for its multitude of perfectly-timed dry gags, the true greatness of the Greg Daniels-developed collection lay in weaving advanced, profound research of its huge ensemble of characters. The Scranton workers had been all so charming, so alive, that, by the previous couple of seasons, you would inform all the things any one in all them was considering simply from a fast look to the digital camera.

Formally, too, “The Workplace” proved enormously influential, codifying the mockumentary format right into a commercially viable template — one which continues to be the go-to for community sitcoms all in favour of angling for that very same diploma of character vividness.

If we now know, in 2024, that an important comedy collection does not should be rather more than an excuse to spend time with a charismatic group of associates that involves really feel like our personal, no present ever embodied that understanding extra completely than Fox’s “Dwelling Single.” It was the quintessential hangout sitcom, the quintessential New York Metropolis sitcom, and the quintessential young-adult-urban-life sitcom, all rolled into one.

In addition, “Dwelling Single” had arguably the very best ensemble forged within the style’s historical past, with Queen Latifah, Erika Alexander, Kim Coles, and Kim Fields all creating deeply lived-in, completely distinctive, flawlessly synchronized portrayals of younger girls coming into themselves as they helped one another by way of the trials of affection, household, and career-building. They’d pal chemistry right down to an artwork type lengthy earlier than it was a go-to sitcom software, and the Yvette Denise Lee-led writers’ room understood their characters so alchemically that they nearly did not really feel written in any respect.

Few community TV reveals, comedic or in any other case, have ever endeavored to be as experimental, ingenious, and subversive as “Group.” The Dan Harmon-created NBC present started as a zany and absurdist but more-or-less conventional sitcom about seven group school college students who type a Spanish examine group. Over time, nonetheless, it grew out of the confines of its primary premise and have become a sitcom Rubik’s dice, the place each trope and conference of the style was repeatedly twisted round on its axis within the brainiest, wildest methods possible.

All that deconstructionist aptitude would not have labored with out a basis of extraordinarily robust character comedy, and, beneath the sound and fury, “Group” was additionally among the finest found-family reveals ever — a years-long examine of all of the methods wherein a bunch of misfits with little in widespread might profoundly remodel one another’s lives. As sitcom milieus go, it does not get higher than Greendale.

The legacy of NBC’s “The Cosby Present” has inevitably been tarnished by the greater than 60 accusations of sexual assault made in opposition to Invoice Cosby — not solely as a result of it now feels mistaken to throw the present a lot help whereas its co-creator and star remains to be taking advantage of it, however as a result of, even seen in a vacuum, “The Cosby Present” is enormously contingent on Cosby’s character and its would-be mild trustworthiness.

In consequence, it is now nearly not possible to see previous the self-marketing fraud of all of it and recognize the collective expertise and craftsmanship on show in “The Cosby Present,” which was arguably the defining archetype of American household sitcoms till just some years in the past. The truth that so most of the actors who handed by way of it grew to become superstars tells you all the things it’s essential to know in regards to the present’s mastery of its medium.

There was nothing fairly like “The Mary Tyler Moore Present” when it premiered in 1970: A slick, cosmopolitan sitcom about an impartial working lady and her bustling skilled profession. Now, 50 years later, there’s nonetheless not very like it in TV comedy, so far as grappling earnestly with girls’s place within the enterprise world goes.

Few occasions in historical past has any collection — not to mention such a well-liked, influential one — handled the spirit of the occasions in such a head-on means as this James L. Brooks and Allan Burns-created CBS sensation, which ran topical points by way of a revolving door and owned as much as onerous realities of being an grownup within the massive metropolis like there was nothing to it. Moore’s sly, powerful, sensible information producer Mary Richards shifted cultural notions of what a profitable lady could possibly be, and, with assist from an innovatively layered and fleshed-out forged of supporting characters, she did all of it whereas exhibiting the world a superb time.

Typically, it does not take rather more than a single bar in Boston, its common patrons, and their numerous conversations and altercations to make 11 years of strong TV gold. NBC’s “Cheers” wasn’t only a cultural phenomenon with rankings nearly too big to fathom; it was the definitive testomony to the sitcom as a humanist gathering of personalities and affections, a banquet to the very act of being alive, in all its magnificence and heartache.

The years-long romantic whirlwind between Sam (Ted Danson) and Diane (Shelley Lengthy) was arguably essentially the most iconic in TV historical past as much as that time. The ensemble round them was a murderers’ row. And the writing was simply one thing else — character-based comedy that managed to get funnier and richer because the characters grew deeper and the viewers grew hooked up to them.

Lots of sitcoms all through historical past have tried to be “live-action cartoons,” with the diploma of elastic abandon and gag density that you just’d see on an animated present untethered from real-world legal guidelines of physics and human conduct, however none have come even near pulling it off with as a lot success as “30 Rock.”

Along with being a sturdy, expertly-crafted satire wherein New York Metropolis’s TV trade served as a microcosm of all that was absurd in the US, the Tina Fey-created comedy was an achievement in grand structure: By no means earlier than or since has any collection provided so many jokes per minute with such a excessive ratio of hilarity. Each scene was an unfathomable bevy of gags, down to each throwaway line and each enhancing and music selection, with out a single wasted beat. It is mind-boggling stuff simply on the extent of craft, even earlier than you get to how hysterical it’s to expertise.

Floor zero for the dry, fast-paced, documentary-style trendy office sitcom was “The Larry Sanders Present,” a collection that, in its personal means, proved as a lot of a game-changer for TV comedy as fellow ’90s HBO productions like “Oz” and “The Sopranos” did for drama.

The brainchild of Garry Shandling and Dennis Klein, with a scathing showbiz outlook largely knowledgeable by Shandling’s personal experiences within the trade, “The Larry Sanders Present” inaugurated the varsity of sitcoms that break away from the style’s lowest-common-denominator confines by providing a continuous barrage of wit, intelligence, and satirical precision, whereas layering jokes on prime of jokes with gleeful hyperactivity. Unflaggingly genuine, brilliantly-acted, and directed with cinematic aptitude, it was the present that put HBO on the scripted TV map and introduced tv roaring into the Twenty first century — eight years earlier than the actual fact.

Whereas most originators from the early years of TV have since handed into historical-interest curios, CBS’s “I Love Lucy” stays an irresistible beam of sunshine to today, with a majority of its 180 episodes nonetheless ringing with as a lot pleasure and goofy enjoyable as ever (give or take the occasional “Oof, they’d bizarre values within the ’50s” clunker).

The present’s writers and actors managed to not solely invent and refine the ensemble sitcom format in actual time, however to do it whereas honing a sure alchemy of crowd-pleasing leisure so highly effective that it has but to be topped — you will discover that the highest two reveals on this checklist are each darkish, cynical affairs, as a result of, as sunny comedy goes, “I Love Lucy” is just the gold customary. For thousands and thousands of followers world wide within the twentieth century, Lucille Ball was some sort of ethereal trickster deity, whisking viewers away right into a realm of easy stomach laughs week after week. Many sitcoms endeavor to create a comfy, pleasant little world the place all the things is okay for half-hour, however none have completed it higher than the archetypal authentic.

Structured, sequenced, and shot like a maddeningly advanced crime drama, filled with large serialized arcs and callbacks and webs of intrigue that required flowcharts to observe, “Arrested Growth” broke so many boundaries and invented so many new paradigms for sitcoms in its authentic 2003-2006 Fox run that it was nearly onerous to maintain tempo.

The narrative complexity was matched by the humor: Jokes can be quietly arrange in a single episode and repay entire seasons later. Background gags would require a number of viewings or a pause button to be totally appreciated. Runners would construct in sophistication and tackle new layers with every iteration. A complete understanding of American politics and tradition can be required for a lot of the vicious satire to land. On the similar time, the moment-to-moment was all the time hilarious, artfully flowing from the driest rejoinders to essentially the most over-the-top pratfalls with splendid assist from a forged the place each single member was or grew to become comedy royalty. It was galaxy-brain tv comedy.

Lastly, it could not be something however this. No different work has ever perfected the sitcom type so completely, reaching such an enlightened understanding of the important tenets of mining comedy out of conditions. An episode of “Seinfeld” could possibly be a plot-heavy farce filled with ironic twists of destiny and quasi-tragic arcs, or it could possibly be nearly actually about nothing, and it might inevitably be hilarious both means.

The way in which that the writers (led by Larry David earlier than he left) would construct on extremely explicit observational moments, deriving new, more and more maddening moments from them in a cascade of mundane surreality, approached Renaissance-era inventive refinement. The way in which that Julia Louis-Dreyfus, Jason Alexander, Michael Richards, and typically even Jerry Seinfeld himself would inhabit these moments was epic, with every forged member conjuring up iconic line deliveries and bodily comedy feats by the minute. There was no morality, no pathos, no classes, no advanced character arcs: “Seinfeld” was about making individuals giggle, full cease, by way of and thru. And that it did.