Spooky season is still a few months away, but that doesn’t mean you can’t enjoy a scary movie. The horror genre is exploding in popularity in the 2020s, and as major releases continue to hit the big screen, the streaming era has made it easier than ever to revisit favorites from across the decades from the comfort of your own home (meaning nobody will see you cowering under the blankets or hear the shocked screams) and sometimes completely free.
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While major platforms like Netflix, HBO Max, and Hulu come with hefty and rising price tags, other platforms like Tubi, Plex, and Pluto TV offer deep catalogs that are constantly growing and are available completely free, and that includes horror titles. This May, the streamers grew their horror catalogs with dozens of great additions, ranging from a cult favorite ‘90s slasher to a movie considered to be one of the best horror films of the 21st century, and all you need is a compatible device and an active internet connection to start watching!
10. Green Room – Plex & Tubi
A down-on-their-luck punk rock band meets a violent group of neo-Nazi skinheads in Jeremy Saulnier’s 2015 hidden horror gem Green Room. Despite holding an impressive 90% critic rating on Rotten Tomatoes, the horror-thriller film, starring the late Anton Yelchin opposite Patrick Stewart, has been criminally overlooked, but it’s now easier and cheaper than ever to stream after it joined both Plex and Tubi on May 1st.
Green Room isn’t for the faint of heart, though. From the moment the band is trapped to the final scenes of the film, the movie maintains a state of unrelenting dread and adrenaline that keeps you on the edge of your seat, and the cat-and-mouse game never feels like it overstays its welcome. And unlike a lot of horror movies where the characters make impossible, heroic decisions, Green Room features characters who act in ways that feel realistic, their fear and inexperience resulting in costly mistakes.
9. Leprechaun – Plex
This isn’t your average slasher. Mark Jones’ 1993 cult classic Leprechaun is a chaotic, campy, supernatural horror-comedy that thrives on absurdity. The movie blends traditional horror with Irish folklore for a bizarre story about a magical entity who can be trapped with a four-leaf clover, has an uncontrollable compulsion to polish shoes, is obsessed with his pot of gold, and uses a tricycle, a wheelchair, and a pogo stick to chase victims. It’s hilarious, downright absurd, and an absolute blast.
While St. Patrick’s Day has already past, there’s never a bad time to stream Leprechaun, especially when it’s available for free. The movie joined Plex’s free streaming lineup on May 1st alongside a handful of other horror titles.
8. Bram Stoker’s Dracula – Tubi
Bram Stoker’s Dracula has served as the inspiration of countless adaptations in the more than a century since its release, but none have been quite as good as Francis Ford Coppola’s Bram Stoker’s Dracula. The movie is widely considered the definitive cinematic version of the story. While the movie does deviate a bit from the novel, introducing a tragic love story between Dracula and Mina Harker that does not exist in the original text, it maintains everything from the atmospheric gothic horror and visual style of the book to the multiple-narrator structure that is typically dropped in screen adaptations.
The 1992 film, starring Gary Oldman, Winona Ryder, Anthony Hopkins, and Keanu Reeves, holds a 69% critic score and 79% audience score on Rotten Tomatoes. Beyond being a great take on the Dracula story, the movie features breathtaking cinematography, amazing practical effects, and iconic costume designs.
7. Hereditary – Tubi
It’s one of the best horror movies of the 21st century, and it’s now streaming completely free. Ari Aster’s 2018 supernatural psychological horror film Hereditary started streaming on Tubi on May 1st.
One of the primary catalysts that brought elevated horror mainstream, the movie is just as focused on family dynamics, grief, and the transmission of generational trauma as it is on its supernatural horror elements. It centers around the Graham family, who, following the death of their secretive matriarch, become haunted by disturbing occurrences and uncover a sinister, inescapable legacy. Its a type of horror that challenges the viewer emotionally, and it’s slow-tension build creates a suffocating atmosphere that gets under your skin and stays long after the movie ends.
6. House At The End Of The Street – Tubi
The same year she made her debut as Katniss Everdeen in The Hunger Games, Jennifer Lawrence appeared in her first-ever horror movie, House at the End of the Street. The thriller/horror movie sees Lawrence take on the role of Elissa Cassidy, a teenager who moves into a new home with her mother only to discover that the house next door was the site of a gruesome double murder.
House at the End of the Street joined Tubi’s horror lineup on May 1st and is a great watch for atmosphere, suspense, and unexpected twists over excessive gore. It’s a pretty entertaining thriller that keeps you guessing as the mystery is slowly unraveled, and as one of Lawrence’s only two forays into horror (she later starred in Mother!), the actress delivers a strong performance that shows her acting chops in the genre.
5. Lake Placid – Tubi
Creature features are one of the longest-running subgenres in horror, and fans can stream one of the most iconic completely free. On May 1st, Lake Placid started streaming on Tubi. Directed by Steve Miner and featuring an unexpectedly talented cast, including Bill Pullman, Bridget Fonda, Brendan Gleeson, and Oliver Platt, the movie centers around a dysfunctional team of police and scientists who must work together to capture or kill a massive, man-eating crocodile.
Although the movie didn’t garner the best consensus from critics and general audiences, holding just 47% and 37% Tomatometer and Popcornmeter scores on Rotten Tomatoes, its status as a campy, bloody, and ridiculously fun film was enough to launch an entire franchise. Since that 1999 original, five additional Lake Placid movies have been released, including Lake Placid: The Final Chapter, which is also available for free streaming on Tubi.
4. Misery – Tubi
In the overall ranking of Stephen King adaptations over the decades, Misery remains a strong contender for being one of the best. Rob Reiner’s 1990 psychological horror thriller is a gripping battle of wills that explores the darker side of obsession as Kathy Bates’ Annie Wilkes kidnaps James Caan’s Paul Sheldon.
Misery joined Tubi on May 1st, and it’s a great streaming option for any fan of horror. The movie delivers an Oscar-award-winning performance from Bates, unbearable tension, and themes that, more than three decades later, remain extremely relevant. Misery is also a pretty engrossing survival story as James must find a way to escape his deranged captor after a car accident, and despite being more focused on psychological horror than jump scares, the suffocating cat-and-mouse game is genuinely terrifying.
3. The Mist – Tubi
Stephen King is known as the King of Horror for good reason, and so it’s no surprise that not one, but two adaptations of his works have made this list, and they’re both streaming on Tubi! The very same day Misery joined the platform, The Mist also started streaming on the free streamer.
Frank Darabont’s adaptation of King’s 1980 novel of the same name is without a doubt one of the bleakest and most impactful of King’s stories. The movie centers around a group of survivors trapped in a grocery store when a mysterious mist hiding otherworldly creatures engulfs a small Maine town. While the movie offers plenty of scares and great creatures, the true horror stems from the paranoia and descent into madness among the survivors as fear mounts and they split into factions. It all leads to a truly unforgettable ending that will leave you haunted well after the end credits role.
2. The Silence Of The Lambs – Pluto TV
If you want a masterclass in psychological horror and suspense, then look no further than The Silence of the Lambs. Released in 1991 as an adaptation of Thomas Harris’s 1988 novel, the movie stars Jodie Foster as a young FBI trainee who must seek the psychological insight of an imprisoned, cannibalistic murderer in order to catch a serial killer who skins his victims.
The Silence of the Lambs is one of only a few films to win the “Big Five” Academy Awards (Best Picture, Director, Actor, Actress, and Screenplay), and it’s really deserving of all of them. The film blends intimate, claustrophobic cinematography with exceptional performances as it creates a deeply unsettling atmosphere with the mental battle between Clarice Starling and Hannibal Lecter. It’s a cinematic masterpiece that leaves the viewer with the suspense of a crime film and the visceral terror of a horror movie.
1. 30 Days Of Night (2007) – Pluto TV
There are a lot of great vampire movies out there – after all, they are one of the most popular cinematic monsters – but few have managed to be as genuinely terrifying as 30 Days of Night. Directed by David Slade and starring Josh Hartnett and Melissa George, the movie is set in the isolated town of Barrow, Alaska, where a small group of survivors must endure a month-long polar night while being hunted by a bloodthirsty gang of vampires.
Despite only scoring a 50% critic score and 56% audience rating on Rotten Tomatoes, 30 Days of Night is a great watch if you’re looking for a gritty, intense, and terrifying take on the vampire genre. The vampires are an absolutely formidable force and some of the scariest to have ever graced the screen, and the movie expertly uses the unique Alaskan setting and period of darkness to double down on their terror. 30 Days of Night is now rightfully considered a cult classic by many and even led to a sequel, 30 Days Of Night: Dark Days, which is also streaming free on Pluto TV.
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