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.

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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)
san diego, california   july 23 kevin feige, president of marvel studios, participates in the marvel studios’ live action presentation at san diego comic con on july 23, 2022 photo by jesse grantgetty images for disney
Jesse Grant//Getty Images

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 sadsack Steve Rogers getting absolutely tonked and sorting out World War Two.

Marvel films in chronological order

  • Captain America: The First Avenger (1942)
  • Captain Marvel (1995)
  • Iron Man (2010)
  • Iron Man 2 (2011)
  • The Incredible Hulk (2011)
  • Thor (2011)
  • The Avengers (2012)
  • Iron Man 3 (2012)
  • Thor: The Dark World (2013)
  • Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)
  • Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
  • Guardians of the Galaxy 2 (2014)
  • Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)
  • Ant-Man (2015)
  • Captain America: Civil War (2016)
  • Black Widow (2016)
  • Spider-Man: Homecoming (2016)
  • Doctor Strange (2016-2017)
  • Black Panther (2017)
  • Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
  • Avengers: Infinity War (2017)
  • Ant-Man and the Wasp (2017)
  • Avengers: Endgame (2017-2022)
  • Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2023)
  • Spider-Man: Far From Home (2023)
  • Eternals (2023, apart from the bits set millions of years ago obviously)
  • Spider-Man: No Way Home (2024)
  • Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2025)
  • Thor: Love and Thunder (2026)

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)