As the Number of Original Shows on Television Continues to Drop, Sci Fi Entries Are Declining as Well

Peak TV appears to be well in the rearview mirror as the number of original shows on television continues to drop. Luminate has put out an analysis showing notable declines in production over the past three years after hitting an all-time high in 2022. Those numbers include reality and game shows, but scripted originals have been dropping as well, especially among sci fi and fantasy entries. FX usually produces an analysis around this time that focuses on scripted shows, but that has not been released yet. The numbers from Luminate, though, do emphasize the decline in television originals that has become an ongoing trend.

A total of 1,122 shows premiered in 2025, according to the company’s numbers, which represents an 11% drop from 2024 and a 34% drop from the 2022 high point of 1,695 shows. Among the major platforms, the broadcast networks have seen a 22% drop since 2022, cable nets have seen a 35% drop, and streaming services have seen a 36% drop. Some of this was driven by the aftereffects of COVID as well as the Writers’ and Actors’ strikes. But none of this should come as a surprise, seeing as there are only a limited number of hours in the day, and eventually Peak TV had to hit its crest. I have been predicting this for a while, though we still don’t appear to be at a bubble-bursting point, more of a market correction.

If you look at the numbers in the chart, the streamers are still above where they were in 2019, which already represented a high point for them. They continued to grow for several more years and have since slipped back down, but they are still producing content at a notable rate. It is broadcast and cable that have taken the biggest hit since 2019, and the drop is even more significant when you look at just scripted shows (which I did for the Fall 2025 season at this link). The fact is that scripted originals have practically disappeared from the basic cable channels, and they currently represent only about a third of the programming on the broadcast networks.

As for sci fi and fantasy shows, the numbers are down for a fourth season in a row, and it does not look like that will be changing soon. I have been tracking the premieres of genre shows (new and returning), and we have seen those numbers dropping for quite a while now. The 2021–22 season had a high point of 111 sci fi and fantasy premieres, but for the 2025–26 season we are on track for only 66, a 40% drop. Each year, those numbers have declined since hitting their peak, and we have not seen them level out yet. And the fact is that the premieres scheduled for the second half of the current season are rather sparse, making my estimate fairly generous at this point.

Still, this doesn’t mean that production of sci fi and fantasy shows has stopped; it has just slowed notably. I am continuing to see regular development announcements, including some high-dollar shows like Amazon’s upcoming Warhammer 40K (starring Henry Cavill), HBO’s Lanterns, and Apple TV’s Neuromancer. But we are seeing fewer of those high-cost shows, and production announcements have not been as frequent over the past six months or so. Plus, if you look at the basic cable channels and broadcast nets, sci fi is pretty much absent, with the exception of AMC and FX (and a couple of stragglers on Syfy).

So what’s next? Will the number of scripted shows continue to decline, and will we eventually call this the bursting of the Peak TV bubble? That is definitely possible, but we are not there yet. Reality and game shows continue to dominate programming on the linear networks, and we are seeing more of those from the streaming services as well, so they will continue to have a presence. Scripted programming will not go away; I just expect to see fewer super-expensive shows getting the greenlight. And that is not necessarily a bad thing. Apple TV has figured out how to make good scripted originals without the Stranger Things-type budget (for example, Foundation is reported to run around $50–60 million per season versus over $400 million for Stranger Things Season 5), and perhaps other streamers can learn from that approach.

Even if the current season produces only 66 genre premieres, that is still a lot of television and more than the average person can keep up with (I am following, at best, about a third of those). There are still plenty of sci fi and fantasy shows available on television, just not the overload we were seeing a few years back. And we have not seen the cancellation rate increase all that much, so it’s not as though genre entries are suffering too badly at this point. We may not have as many choices, but there are still a decent number of sci fi TV shows putting out new episodes.

Keep up with the status of all the current sci fi and fantasy shows as well as news and updates on new and upcoming shows at CancelledSciFi.com.

Cancellation Watch: Status updates and breaking news on renewals and cancellations

Sci Fi TV Highlights: Listings for the upcoming week along with the latest sci fi TV news and trailers.

Sci Fi TV Production Report: News on which sci fi TV shows are moving into production.

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