How to watch the Marvel movies in order before Avengers: Doomsday

Updated Sep 28, 2026: Added Spider-Man: Brand New Day’s home-release dates and rechecked every Disney+ listing.

Want to watch the Marvel movies in order before Avengers: Doomsday opens on December 18? You’ve got two real options and one shortcut. Release order is how the story was actually built. Chronological order is a fun rewatch. And if you don’t have 80-odd hours lying around (be honest, you don’t), the eight-film homework list gets you ready for Robert Downey Jr.’s Doctor Doom in a couple of weekends.

Good news: this is the first time the whole thing is this easy on one service. Spider-Man: No Way Home finally reached US Disney+ on April 15, 2026, after years stuck on other platforms, so the entire back catalog now lives on Disney+. The only movie you can’t stream yet is the newest one.

Marvel movies in order of release

This is how we’d watch them the first time. Post-credits scenes set up the next film, reveals land the way they were meant to, and you get to watch the franchise figure itself out in real time. Phase numbers follow Marvel’s own grouping.

Phase One

1. Iron Man (2008)
2. The Incredible Hulk (2008)
3. Iron Man 2 (2010)
4. Thor (2011)
5. Captain America: The First Avenger (2011)
6. The Avengers (2012)

Phase Two

7. Iron Man 3 (2013)
8. Thor: The Dark World (2013)
9. Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014)
10. Guardians of the Galaxy (2014)
11. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015)
12. Ant-Man (2015)

Phase Three

13. Captain America: Civil War (2016)
14. Doctor Strange (2016)
15. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2 (2017)
16. Spider-Man: Homecoming (2017)
17. Thor: Ragnarok (2017)
18. Black Panther (2018)
19. Avengers: Infinity War (2018)
20. Ant-Man and the Wasp (2018)
21. Captain Marvel (2019)
22. Avengers: Endgame (2019)
23. Spider-Man: Far From Home (2019)

Phase Four

24. Black Widow (2021)
25. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings (2021)
26. Eternals (2021)
27. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021)
28. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022)
29. Thor: Love and Thunder (2022)
30. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)

Phase Five

31. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania (2023)
32. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 (2023)
33. The Marvels (2023)
34. Deadpool & Wolverine (2024)
35. Captain America: Brave New World (2025)
36. Thunderbolts* (2025)

Phase Six (so far)

37. The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025)
38. Spider-Man: Brand New Day (2026)

That’s 38 movies. Next up: Avengers: Doomsday on Dec 18, 2026, then Avengers: Secret Wars on Dec 17, 2027.

We left out the Disney+ specials (Werewolf by Night, The Guardians of the Galaxy Holiday Special) and the TV shows. Both are optional for a movies-only run. The one show we’d make an exception for is Loki, and we explain why in the homework section.

Marvel movies in chronological order

This order follows when each story takes place, not when it came out. It’s close to the timeline Marvel uses on Disney+, with one change we’ll defend below. Save it for a rewatch, though: Captain Marvel and Black Widow both spoil things the earlier-released films were built around.

1. Captain America: The First Avenger (set during WWII)
2. Captain Marvel (1995)
3. Iron Man
4. Iron Man 2
5. The Incredible Hulk
6. Thor
7. The Avengers
8. Thor: The Dark World
9. Iron Man 3
10. Captain America: The Winter Soldier
11. Guardians of the Galaxy
12. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2
13. Avengers: Age of Ultron
14. Ant-Man
15. Captain America: Civil War
16. Black Widow
17. Black Panther
18. Spider-Man: Homecoming
19. Doctor Strange
20. Thor: Ragnarok
21. Ant-Man and the Wasp
22. Avengers: Infinity War
23. Avengers: Endgame
24. Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings
25. Spider-Man: Far From Home
26. Eternals
27. Spider-Man: No Way Home
28. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness
29. Black Panther: Wakanda Forever
30. Thor: Love and Thunder
31. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Quantumania
32. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3
33. The Marvels
34. Deadpool & Wolverine
35. Captain America: Brave New World
36. Thunderbolts*
37. Spider-Man: Brand New Day

Wait, where’s The Fantastic Four: First Steps? Some guides, Rotten Tomatoes’ among them, slot it second because its retro-futurist world looks like the 1960s. We don’t. It takes place on a different Earth entirely, so it doesn’t fit anywhere on the main timeline. Watch it last, right before Doomsday. Its four heroes are confirmed for the new Avengers film, and you’ll want them fresh in your head.

The post-Endgame films also bunch up. Shang-Chi, Far From Home, Eternals and No Way Home all happen in roughly the same stretch, so shuffling them around a bit doesn’t matter.

The Doomsday homework: eight movies if you’re short on time

Doomsday brings together heroes from three universes: the main MCU, the Fantastic Four’s world, and the Fox X-Men’s. You don’t need 38 movies to follow that. You need to know who these people are and why the multiverse is falling apart. Here’s our list, picked from the confirmed cast, not from leaks.

1. Avengers: Endgame (2019). The end of the Infinity Saga, and the last time Downey played Tony Stark. Casting him as Doom only lands if you remember why that goodbye mattered. It also brings back the Steve Rogers that Chris Evans is returning to play.
2. Spider-Man: No Way Home (2021). The best single explainer for how the MCU multiverse works: other universes bleeding in, with real consequences. Now on Disney+, finally.
3. Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness (2022). It introduces “incursions,” where universes collide, and it has Patrick Stewart’s first MCU appearance as a Professor X variant. Stewart is confirmed for Doomsday.
4. Deadpool & Wolverine (2024). The bridge from Fox’s X-Men movies to Marvel Studios, and the origin of Channing Tatum’s Gambit, who’s also in the Doomsday cast. Easily the funniest homework you’ll ever get assigned.
5. Captain America: Brave New World (2025). Where Sam Wilson stands as Captain America now. Anthony Mackie is back for Doomsday.
6. Thunderbolts* (2025). Florence Pugh’s Yelena and Sebastian Stan’s Bucky, both in Doomsday, get the movie that sets up where the Avengers name stands going in. Our favorite of the recent run, no notes.
7. The Fantastic Four: First Steps (2025). Non-negotiable. Reed, Sue, Ben and Johnny come from a different universe, and Doom is their villain first.
8. Spider-Man: Brand New Day (2026). The newest MCU film and, at about $2.5 billion worldwide, the biggest movie of the year. It’s not on Disney+ yet (see below), so once it hits digital it’s the one you’ll have to rent or buy.

If you watch one show: make it Loki, both seasons. It’s the MCU’s clearest story about how the multiverse got started, and it’ll make the “collapse” in Doomsday’s premise way easier to follow.

What you can skip: Nearly all of Phases One and Two, if you already know the broad strokes, plus Eternals and Thor: Love and Thunder. They’re fine for a lazy Sunday. They just aren’t what Doomsday is drawing on, as far as anything Marvel has shown.

For the villain’s comic-book backstory, read our Doctor Doom explainer. For the mutants, see every X-Man confirmed in the MCU so far.

Where to stream every Marvel movie

Checked Sep 27, 2026, for the US.

Brand New Day is a Sony release, so it follows Sony’s path, not Disney’s. Physical copies land Nov 17. Digital purchase or rental usually shows up a few weeks before the discs, but the latest reports say Sony will drop both on the same day. Sony hasn’t confirmed either way. Subscription streaming comes later: reports expect Netflix first and Disney+ sometime in 2027, and neither date has been announced. We’re tracking it in our Brand New Day streaming guide.

Our take: release order wins, but the homework list is honest

Chronological order is a neat party trick. It’s also the worst way to meet this franchise. Captain Marvel plays better once you know what Nick Fury became. And watching Black Widow before Infinity War turns a movie built as a eulogy into a prequel.

The bigger point: Doomsday seems pitched at a wider crowd than the average Marvel movie. Downey is back, Evans is back, and the Fox X-Men are here in force. Nobody showing up in December will have done all 38 movies, and the Russos know it. So the eight on our list are there to make the reunions hit harder, not because the plot needs them to make sense.

Only have time for three? Endgame, First Steps and Deadpool & Wolverine. That covers the man behind the mask, the family he’s obsessed with, and the universe the X-Men are arriving from.

Let’s be real: the MCU made this way harder than it needs to be

We clearly love this stuff, or this guide wouldn’t exist. But some of Marvel’s choices deserve a side-eye.

• 38 movies is a lot of homework. That’s 80-odd hours before the TV shows, and we still told you to add Loki. When the fan-friendly answer is an eight-movie shortcut, that’s a fatigue problem, not a you problem.
• The rights mess never really ends. No Way Home spent years off Disney+ before landing on April 15, 2026, and now Brand New Day, the biggest movie of the year, is headed to Netflix first, with Disney+ somewhere in 2027. So “everything on one service” comes with an asterisk, again.
• The skip list keeps growing. We’re telling you to skip Eternals and Thor: Love and Thunder outright, because nothing Marvel has shown suggests Doomsday leans on them. That’s a lot of recent movies that don’t seem to matter.
• Leaning hard on the past. Downey back (as a new character, but still), Evans back as Steve Rogers, the Fox X-Men back in force. Endgame’s goodbyes were the whole point. Undoing them is a pretty safe box-office bet.

To be fair, Thunderbolts* is our favorite of the recent run, and Brand New Day’s roughly $2.5 billion says audiences haven’t checked out. If Doomsday earns those reunions instead of cashing them in, the homework will be worth it.

What’s next

Avengers: Doomsday opens December 18, 2026, and Avengers: Secret Wars follows on December 17, 2027. We’ll add Doomsday to both lists the week it opens and update the Disney+ table when Brand New Day gets a streaming date.

So which order are you going with: the full release-order marathon, or the eight-movie cram session? Tell us in the comments.