TV Shows Like The X-Files
If you like The X-Files, here are 10 similar TV shows — each with its current AI renewal verdict, so you can see which are still going and which have been cancelled.
FOX · Mystery · The X-Files is ended
The X-Files works because it commits fully to two things that pull in opposite directions: a genuine sense of cosmic dread and a tight, human partnership at its center. Mulder and Scully are not just a procedural duo. They are a philosophical argument given human form, one chasing belief and the other demanding proof, and the tension between them is what keeps even the strangest episodes grounded. The show earns its monster-of-the-week formula because the cases are weird enough to feel genuinely unsettling, and the mythology arc underneath it all gives fans the feeling that something bigger is always lurking just out of frame.
The best shows like The X-Files
1. Criminal Minds
Like The X-Files, Criminal Minds is built around an FBI team working cases that most agents would not touch, and it shares that same interest in getting inside a disturbed mind to understand what drives it. The Behavioral Analysis Unit has its own version of the Mulder-Scully dynamic, pairing intuitive leaps with rigorous analysis. If you liked the procedural bones of The X-Files, this delivers that structure with a sharp psychological edge.
Stream on Amazon Prime Video, Hulu, Paramount Plus Premium, Paramount Plus Essential
Renewed100%
2. The Blacklist
The Blacklist has the same quality of a larger, hidden world operating just beneath the visible surface of law enforcement, which is one of the things that keeps X-Files fans hooked. Red Reddington functions a bit like a Smoking Man who has switched sides, a figure who clearly knows far more than he is saying and doles out information at his own pace. The rookie-agent-paired-with-an-impossible-source setup also echoes the way Scully was originally assigned to Mulder, both as a partner and as a check on him.
Stream on Netflix, Netflix Standard with Ads
Ended0%
3. Fringe
Fringe is the most obvious next step for any X-Files fan: FBI agent, paranormal cases, a skeptic-believer dynamic, and a slow-building mythology involving forces larger than any single case. Walter Bishop is one of television's great eccentric scientists, and the show earns its weirdness the same way The X-Files does, by treating its strange premises seriously rather than playing them for camp. If the mythology episodes are your favorite part of The X-Files, Fringe rewards that kind of investment.
Stream on Hulu
Ended0%
4. The Following
The Following shares The X-Files' taste for obsessive cat-and-mouse chases and the sense that the antagonist is always one step ahead of the investigators. The serial killer premise is dark and stylized, and the show is not shy about how far Carroll's influence extends, which gives it that same feeling of a conspiracy with roots deeper than anyone initially suspects. Fans who liked the darker, more unsettling standalone episodes of The X-Files will find a lot to chew on here.
Stream on Netflix, Netflix Standard with Ads
Cancelled0%
5. CIA
CIA leans directly into the mismatched-partners dynamic that makes The X-Files tick, pairing a rule-following FBI agent with a more instinctive, secretive CIA operative who does not explain himself easily. The covert operations setting keeps the cases from ever feeling fully resolved or fully transparent, which should feel familiar to anyone used to Mulder and Scully working cases where the official answer is never quite the real one. It is a tighter, more grounded show, but the institutional friction and the sense of hidden agendas should feel right at home.
Stream on fuboTV, Paramount Plus Premium, Paramount Plus Essential, Paramount Plus Apple TV Channel
On the Bubble52%
More on shows like The X-Files
Fans of The X-Files tend to want a few specific things in their next show: federal agents doing work that feels slightly outside the normal chain of command, mysteries that do not resolve too cleanly, and a central partnership or ensemble where personality friction is built into the premise. Pure procedurals can feel too tidy, and pure sci-fi can lose the grounded law-enforcement texture that makes The X-Files feel real. The best recommendations sit somewhere in the middle, where institutional structures are present but the cases keep slipping past what those structures can explain or contain.
The closest match in spirit is Fringe, which is almost a direct descendant, swapping Scully's medical skepticism for Walter Bishop's brilliant and unhinged fringe science and expanding the conspiracy into alternate dimensions. Criminal Minds and The Blacklist both stay firmly in the FBI world, though they trade the paranormal for the psychological. Criminal Minds builds its tension through behavioral profiling and dark criminal logic, while The Blacklist adds a layer of moral ambiguity through its enigmatic informant, Red Reddington, who knows more than he ever fully reveals. The Following goes to a darker, more stylized place with its serial killer premise, and CIA takes the institutional partnership dynamic and plants it in the world of covert intelligence operations. None of these are perfect substitutes for The X-Files, but taken together they cover most of what makes it worth watching.
Criminal Minds is the most procedural of the group and the most consistent in its structure. The Blacklist has more serialized mystery running beneath its case-driven surface. Fringe is the one that most directly chases that feeling of reality bending in ways that cannot be fully explained. The Following is the most stylized and the most violent, which will suit some fans and put others off. CIA is the smallest in scope but leans hardest into the mismatched-partners dynamic. Start with Fringe if the paranormal mythology is what you love most about The X-Files. Start with The Blacklist if the slow reveal of a larger conspiracy is what keeps you watching.
More shows like The X-Files
Frequently asked
- What is the most popular show like The X-Files?
- Criminal Minds is the most popular show similar to The X-Files in the IsItRenewed catalogue.
- Are shows like The X-Files still on the air?
- Of the 10 shows similar to The X-Files listed here, 1 currently carry a renewed verdict — the rest are cancelled, ended, or awaiting a decision.
- How does IsItRenewed pick shows like The X-Files?
- The recommendations come from TMDB's similar-titles data, and each is shown with its current AI renewal verdict so you know which are still going.