30 Best Animated Movies On Netflix [December 2023]

With streaming services like Netflix filling our homes with endless amounts of content on a weekly basis, it can sometimes be a chore to even find what you want to watch at any given moment. So when you're in the mood to move away from the "real world" and immerse yourself in a film filled with imaginative, visual splendor, where can you turn? What can you do? What possible options do you have?

Well, never fear because we've got you covered on all the best animated feature films that are waiting for you on Netflix! From family favorites and adult masterpieces to television adaptations and original stories crafted for the silver screen, the world of feature animation is rich and varied. And compiled for your viewing pleasure, here are the best of the best for your perusal on Netflix at this very moment!

Updated on November 30, 2023: Because Netflix is constantly updating their expansive catalog, we'll be refreshing this list each month with new animated flicks for your enjoyment. So whether you're looking for a cartoon that's for the whole family or a film that's a little more grown-up, we'll keep things current each month with new selections.

Richard Linklater is a masterful indie filmmaker of many talents, and with "Apollo 10 1/2," he combines the dreamlike animation of his "Waking Life" and "A Scanner Darkly" with the tender unflinching approach to adolescence in "Boyhood," creating a joyful, fun-for-all-ages celebration of the Apollo space program. "Apollo 10 1/2" is a period piece set in suburban Houston, not far from the NASA command center in 1969 in the lead-up to the moon landing. A fantastical take on real events, the plot concerns NASA recruiting a kid to travel to the moon first because they goofed and built the lunar module so small that only a child can use it to travel into space.

• Starring: Jack Black, Bill Wise, Lee Eddy
• Director: Richard Linklater
• Year: 2022
• Runtime: 90 minutes
• Rating: PG-13
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 91%

The gentle, cheeky, stop-motion-animated "Chicken Run" is an action-packed prison escape movie about funny fowl that's fit for the whole family. The chicken residents of a farm in the English countryside have contently settled into their fate as egg layers. But then a rogue and cocky rooster named Rocky moves onto the farm — just in time to save the chickens from certain death. The humans have brought in an automatic meat-pie making machine, and the flightless birds must look to Rocky to help them get off the farm and to a safe island paradise.

• Starring: Mel Gibson, Julia Sawalha, Miranda Richardson
• Directors: Peter Lord, Nick Park
• Year: 2000
• Runtime: 85 minutes
• Rating: G
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 97%

Created by and starring Kid Cudi, feature-length animated special "Entergalactic" serves as an accompaniment to and expansion of the rapper's same-named album. Animated with a combination of styles and techniques that make for lush and engrossing imagery, "Entergalactic" is a sweet romantic comedy-drama that juxtaposes love with the grit and stress of trying to make a living as a creative in New York City. Kid Cudi voices Jabari, an artist on the verge of recognition, who falls in love with his new neighbor, a photographer named Meadow. But it comes at a potentially very bad time. Is love worth it, even at such a cost?

• Starring: Kid Cudi, Jessica Williams, Timothée Chalamet
• Director: Fletcher Moules
• Year: 2022
• Runtime: 92 minutes
• Rating: TV-MA
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 96%

Carlo Collodi's 19th-century tale of Pinocchio, the puppet transformed into a real boy by the wish of a lonely toymaker, has been adapted to films several times. But it's never felt quite as poignant or been quite as visually arresting as the 2022, Oscar-winning version by Guillermo del Toro. Told via beautiful stop-motion animation, this Netflix Original finds Pinocchio going on a dark journey of his brand new soul, learning moral lessons as he gets into dangerous situations under the watchful eye of Sebastian J. Cricket, all while his father, Geppetto, grieves the death of his biological son, Carlo. Meanwhile, every character deals with life under the rule of fascist dictator Benito Mussolini.

• Starring: Gregory Mann, Ewan McGregor, David Bradley
• Directors: Guillermo del Toro
• Year: 2022
• Runtime: 117 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 97%

An Academy Award-nominated piece of gorgeous and electrifying animation, "I Lost My Body" is the surreal story of young Naoufel and his severed hand (it's a long story). The film charmingly tracks these two in tandem — Naoufel and his life leading up to the moment he lost his hand and the present-day hand journeying across France to reunite with his body. As surreal as it is painfully down-to-earth, "I Lost My Body" is a perfect piece of adult animation that's both visually and emotionally compelling.

• Starring: Hakim Faris, Victoire Du Bois, Patrick d'Assumcao
• Director: Jeremy Clapin
• Year: 2019
• Runtime: 81 minutes
• Rating: TV-MA
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 96%

Barely two years old and already an instant holiday classic, "Klaus" puts a new spin on the origin story of old Saint Nick himself, taking us along on the journey of a selfish postman named Jesper, whose blooming friendship with a reclusive toymaker — the titular Klaus — becomes the basis for Christmas traditions across the globe. With gorgeous hand-drawn animation, fun character design, and a heart of gold, "Klaus" is that perfect film to give you the Christmas spirit at any time of the year.

• Starring: Jason Schwartzman, J.K. Simmons, Rashida Jones
• Director: Sergio Pablos
• Year: 2019
• Runtime: 98 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 94%

One of 2021's most genuinely surprising comedy hits, "The Mitchells vs. the Machines" is a jam-packed, utterly hysterical film from Sony Pictures Animation that's not only one of the best animated movies of the year but one of the best movies, period. In a last ditch effort to bond with his college-bound daughter, Rick Mitchell tosses his family's plane tickets and trades them in for a cross-country road trip, which just so happens to coincide with a robot apocalypse uprising. Together, it's up to the Mitchell family to save the planet while also learning to be a great family. 

• Starring: Abbi Jacobson, Danny McBride, Maya Rudolph
• Director: Michael Rianda
• Year: 2021
• Runtime: 114 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 98%

Based on the popular comic of the same name, comedic adventure "Nimona" takes place in a tech-heavy future world that also harkens back to the romanticized medieval days of kings, quests, and chivalry. A once-noble knight named Ballister Boldheart sees his reputation diminished when he's wrongfully accused of an awful crime. In order to clear his name, he must seek out the assistance of Nimona, a teenaged agent of chaos and monstrous shapeshifter he's actually been ordered to kill. Alliances and goals shift quickly as heroes become villains, villains become heroes, and Nimona gleefully destroys stuff.

• Starring: Chloe Grace Moretz, Riz Ahmed, Eugene Lee Yang
• Directors: Nick Bruno and Troy Quane
• Year: 2023
• Runtime: 99 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 94%

In this second "Puss in Boots" movie, rogue feline hero Puss in Boots embarks on one last daring adventure when he realizes he's lost eight of his nine feline lives. In order to retrieve them, he seeks out the Wishing Star in the Black Forest. But, unable to exercise his usual brand of reckless bravery, he has to rely on tenuous partnerships with friend-turned-rival Kitty Softpaws and the annoyingly happy dog Perrito. Their hunt for the Wishing Star takes them on a journey through fairy tale send-ups, like a villainous Goldilocks, a crime syndicate run by the Three Bears, and the Big Bad Wolf, now a tenacious bounty hunter.

• Starring: Antonio Banderas, Salma Hayek, Olivia Colman
• Director: Joel Crawford
• Year: 2022
• Runtime: 102 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 95%

Shaun the Sheep — the lovable wooly critter introduced in Wallace and Gromit's "A Close Shave" – is back on the big screen after his wildly popular first cinematic outing "The Shaun the Sheep Movie." Naturally, things have taken a turn for the extraterrestrial here in "A Shaun the Sheep Movie: Farmageddon" as Shaun and his animal pals must help their new alien friend, Lu-La, return home and avoid getting in the hands of nefarious forces. As is typical with the "Shaun the Sheep" franchise, this is a film filled with hilarious slapstick humor, charming stop-motion animation, and all the heart you can expect from a lovable sheep named Shaun.

• Starring: Justin Fletcher, John Sparkes, Kate Harbour
• Directors: Richard Phelan & Will Becher
• Year: 2019
• Runtime: 86 minutes
• Rating: G
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 96%

Meta, inventive, and visually stunning, "Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse" is one of the most ambitious and entertaining superhero movies ever made. Picking up where "Into the Spider-Verse" leaves off, the mind-bending epic begins with Miles Morales, the Spider-Man of his world. After a surprising reunion, he traverses the multi-verse with Gwen Stacy, aka her universe's Spider-Woman. Soon, they meet the Spider-Society, which brings together Spider-oriented superheroes from many other realities. They've got to stop bad guy the Spot while being careful to not undo the fabric of everyone's realities. But not everyone in the Spider-Society is who they seem to be, and the rules of the multiverse are more complicated than Miles realizes.

• Starring: Shameik Moore, Hailee Steinfeld, Oscar Isaac
• Directors: Joaquim Dos Santos, Kemp Powers, Justin K. Thompson
• Year: 2023
• Runtime: 140 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 96%

From the staggering imagination of Guillermo del Toro, "Trollhunters: Rise of the Titans" hit Netflix in 2021, bringing the epic "Tales of Arcadia" saga to a satisfying conclusion. Granted, you'll have to be familiar with the TV series "Trollhunters," "3Below," and "Wizards" to truly appreciate this gem, but once you're up to speed, you'll be sitting on the edge of your seat as all your favorite heroes take on the Arcane Order and try to save the world from the — you guessed it — rise of the titans. With voice work from beloved figures like Steven Yeun, Nick Offerman, Tatiana Maslany, Kelsey Grammer, and Diego Luna, this is a truly magical adventure for the whole family.

• Starring: Emile Hirsch, Lexi Medrano, Charlie Saxton
• Directors: Johane Matte, Andrew L. Schmidt, Francisco Ruiz Velaco
• Year: 2021
• Runtime: 106 minutes
• Rating: TV-Y7
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 83%

The team at British claymation studio Aardman received Academy Award nominations and statuettes in the early 1990s for their series of shorts starring cheese-loving nerd Wallace and his hyper-intelligent, heroic dog Gromit. Aardman won another Oscar for the feature-length, gently spooky "Wallace and Gromit: The Curse of the Were-Rabbit." In this not-too-scary spoof of old monster movies, a quaint British village is beset by a monster rabbit, who eats all of its crops. Wallace and Gromit, working as pest control professionals, must put a stop to the humongous, ridiculous, floppy-eared menace. In the meantime, they've got to defeat another bad guy, Victor, who wishes to woo Wallace's one true love, Lady Tottington.

• Starring: Peter Sallis, Ralph Fiennes, Helena Bonham Carter
  
• Directors: Nick Park, Steve Box
• Year: 2005
• Runtime: 82 minutes
• Rating: G
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 95%

One of the most widely read and enduring books published by early 20th-century novelist Jack London, "White Fang" is told from the point of view of a young wolf pup, and this all-animated adaptation (that looks like a living painting) faithfully adheres to the source material. After finding himself separated from his mother in the wild, the little wolfdog sets off on a journey of discovery and adventure, adopted into an Indigenous community as a sled dog, stolen and forced into a fighting ring, then freed and rescued by a the human who will become his closest ally.

• Starring: Nick Offerman, Rashida Jones, Paul Giamatti
• Director: Alexandre Espigares
• Year: 2018
• Runtime: 87 minutes
• Rating: NR
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 80%

Sony Pictures Animation is having a rather busy 2021, with "The Mitchells vs. the Machines" already wowing audiences earlier this year and another "Hotel Transylvania" film ready to delight audiences in theaters in just a few months. Not to be forgotten, though, is "Wish Dragon," a charming new film about a young man who finds a dragon in a teapot and has three wishes all to himself. Even if you think the whole three wishes story device isn't so fresh anymore, the film's take on the "genie" legend — mixed with a lush, rich color palette — provides some much needed new perspectives in this not-to-be-missed animated adventure.

• Starring: Jimmy Wong, John Cho, Constance Wu
• Director: Chris Appelhans
• Year: 2021
• Runtime: 102 minutes
• Rating: PG
• Rotten Tomatoes Score: 65%