Apple TV is home to some of the best shows in recent years, often paired with an impressive list of Hollywood A-listers.

The streamer has produced smash hits like Hijack, Pluribus, Severance, Ted Lasso, Shrinking and Your Friends & Neighbors, the latter of which recently returned for a second season.

New to the service is long-awaited For All Mankind prequel Star City, which follows the same fictional history of the original show from the Soviet perspective. Created by Ben Nedivi, Matt Wolpert and Ronald D Moore, the eight-part series stars Anna Maxwell Martin and is set in the 1970s inside the secretive military town that housed the Soviet cosmonaut programme.

There’s also a long list of hidden gems that have flown under the radar, including a less widely publicised (but well worth your time) original like Alexander Skarsgård’s Murderbot, Seth Rogen and Rose Byrne’s Platonic, or Jason Momoa’s Chief of War.

Of course, that isn’t to say that every show on the platform is a winner, which is why the team here at Radio Times has sifted through the selection and picked these 50 standouts that deserve a place on your watchlist.

Have a browse of the best series on Apple TV below, and then get watching! Or, if you fancy, we’ve created a list of the best films on Apple TV, too.

There’s no time to waste…

Showing 1 to 24 of 51 results

  • Alternate-history space drama and For All Mankind prequel that explores Soviet cosmonauts, engineers and spies during a tense reimagined race to the moon. Anna Maxwell Martin and Rhys Ifans star.

  • Two talented police officers vie for supremacy on the streets of contemporary London in an eight-part crime thriller created by BAFTA Award nominee Paul Rutman. Detective Chief Inspector Daniel Hegarty (Peter Capaldi) has a long and distinguished career in the capital and he is determined to protect his legacy at all costs. An anonymous telephone call relating to an old case draws the attention of Hegarty and Detective Sergeant June Lenker (Cush Jumbo), who is eager to impress her superiors in the early stages of her career. Against a backdrop of institutional racism, the two detectives impose their chosen narratives on a historic murder conviction

  • Jon Hamm headlines and executive produces a teasing nine-part drama created by Jonathan Tropper, which has already been commissioned for a second season. Hedge fund manager Andrew Cooper (Jon Hamm) has worked hard – by his standards – to provide for his ex-wife Mel (Amanda Peet) and two children Tori (Isabel Gravitt) and Hunter (Donovan Colan) in the exceedingly affluent Westmont Village. He loses his job in disgrace and a quick check of his finances reveals he has just six months to keep up big-spending pretences before his unemployment will be revealed to wealthy friends and neighbours. Andrew chooses a radical course of action: steal from the homes of his local community and fence the overpriced belongings. As he breaks into neighbouring properties and helps himself to jewellery, handbags and other lucrative merchandise, he unearths hidden affairs and shocking secrets behind polite, well-mannered facades

  • Gun-toting hijackers take control of Kingdom Airlines flight 29 in a high-stakes airborne thriller created by George Kay and Jim Field Smith, which unfolds in real time.

  • Vince Gilligan, creator of Breaking Bad and co-creator of Better Call Saul, unveils a provocative genre-bending drama in which the most miserable person on Earth is charged with saving the world from happiness. A virulent contagion sweeps across the globe and transforms every man, woman and child into blissfully content and optimist citizens. The only person who appears to be immune to the pandemic is historical romance author Carol Sturka (Rhea Seehorn). Operating from her base in Albuquerque, New Mexico, which she shares with her manager and romantic partner Helen (Miriam Shor), Carol staunchly resists the tidal wave of optimism that has washed over her friends and neighbours. She is humanity’s last hope in the battle against endless joy and satisfaction

  • Following an explosion, Sarah Tucker (Ruth Wilson) hires private investigator Zoe Boehm (Emma Thompson) to help her track down a missing girl and in the process, the two women stumble upon a deadly conspiracy in an eight-part thriller adapted from the novel by Mick Herron

  • British intelligence agents atone for career-ending mistakes by serving out the rest of their days in a special department of MI5 led by Gary Oldman’s misanthrope.

  • A plane crash in unforgiving wilderness leads to a daredevil mission on horseback and foot in a gripping survival thriller co-created by Jon Bokenkamp and Richard D’Ovidio. US Marshal Frank Remnick (Jason Clarke) enjoys a peaceful pace of life, overseeing law and order in the rugged landscape of Alaska. A prison transport plane crashes in his jurisdiction, unleashing dozens of violent inmates close to the town he has vowed to keep safe. As Frank draws on his experience to respond to the disaster, he begins to suspect that the crash wasn’t an accident but the result of a masterfully executed plan that only he can thwart

  • Mark leads a team of office workers whose memories have been surgically divided between their work and personal lives. Sci-fi psychological thriller starring Adam Scott.

  • Grief forces a therapist to readjust his own outlook on life in a comedy drama created by Brett Goldstein, Bill Lawrence and lead actor Jason Segel. Co-starring Harrison Ford.

  • Sweeping drama of forbidden love and longing told in Korean, Japanese and English, based on Min Jin Lee’s best-selling novel.

  • Jennifer Aniston and Reese Witherspoon star in a frothy drama exploring the cutthroat world of broadcast news and the lives of the people who help America wake up in the morning.

  • Performed by a predominantly Polynesian cast led by Jason Momoa, “Chief of War” follows the epic and unprecedented telling of the unification and colonisation of Hawai’i at the turn of the 18th century.

  • Revolutionary Dr Hari Seldon predicts the imminent fall of the Empire and the need to rebuild mankind by establishing The Foundation in a sci-fi drama based on Isaac Asimov’s books.

  • Arson investigator Dave Gudsen and police detective Michelle Calderone reluctantly join forces to outwit two serial arsonists. Psychological thriller created and written by Dennis Lehane, inspired by true events, starring Taron Egerton and Jurnee Smollett

  • Young American women cause a commotion among 1870s English aristocracy in a music-driven period drama created by Katherine Jakeways and directed by Susanna White, which is inspired by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Edith Wharton’s unfinished final novel. Led by an all-female creative team, the series focuses on the exploits of Conchita Closson (Alisha Boe), Lizzy Elmsworth (Aubri Ibrag), Mabel Elmsworth (Josie Totah), Jinny St George (Imogen Waterhouse) and her younger sister Annabel aka Nan (Kristine Froseth). The fun-loving quintet have been instructed to secure wealthy husbands and titles by turning heads during a tightly corseted London season. Jinny and Nan’s mother (Christina Hendricks) watches intently as men with power and girls with fortunes disregard centuries of tradition in pursuit of wedded bliss

  • London widow Cora Seaborne (Claire Danes) leaves the city to investigate intriguing reports of a mythical serpent in a mystery based on Sarah Perry’s novel. Also starring Tom Hiddleston.

  • The quickest way to a woman’s heart is through her stomach in a lavish French period drama headlining Benjamin Voisin as the attention-grabbing chef, who became a cause celebre in Napoleon’s Europe. Based on a real-life gastronomic master, who cast a spell over early 19th-century Paris, this eight-part series stirs up intrigue and passion for Antonin Careme as his talents in the kitchen propel him to the dizzy height of culinary stardom. Women adore him, men envy him and powerful politicians exploit Careme’s desire for fame and wealth to engage him as a spy for France. Espionage comes at a high price – his morality and soul – and eventually Careme must decide if he is willing to serve his paymasters their just desserts.

  • Policeman’s son Jimmy Keene is sentenced to 10 years in a minimum-security prison and works with the authorities to extract a confession from suspected serial killer Larry Hall.

  • After 20 years of marriage, filthy rich Molly Novak discovers her husband has betrayed her with a younger woman and demands a divorce. Comedy starring Maya Rudolph.

  • Two long-time friends pose as DEA agents to rob a house and unwittingly stumble into the middle of a bigger criminal enterprise

  • A loveable underdog vows to gatecrash 1969 Palm Beach high society in a life-affirming comedy drama written by Abe Sylvia, based loosely on Juliet McDaniel’s novel Mr & Mrs American Pie. Insatiable social climber Maxine Simmons (Kristen Wiig) arrives in Palm Beach and quickly realises that the dividing line between the haves and have nots is admission to the most exclusive club in town: Palm Royale. Evelyn Rollins (Allison Janney) is queen bee of this hive of dark secrets and she deeply resents Maxine’s efforts to worm her way into rarefied circles where she clearly doesn’t belong. Unperturbed, Maxine makes friends with staff including master mixologist Robert (Ricky Martin) to elbow her way into the club and undermine Evelyn’s influence

  • Former professional golfer Pryce Cahill bets his entire future on troubled 17-year-old sporting phenomenon Santi. Comedy, starring Owen Wilson, Peter Dager, Lilli Kay and Mariana Trevino

  • Dr Parker relocates from Munich to Berlin to manage a busy emergency room and faces resistance from the overworked staff to her necessary reforms