The world’s most popular horror movies revealed, with The Shining taking the top spot

• The Shining is named the most popular horror movie worldwide, receiving 1.07 million searches a month and an IMDb rating of 8.4.
• The Silence of the Lambs places second and has the highest IMDb rating in the top ten at 8.6, while the original 1922 Nosferatu records the most monthly searches at 1.5 million in the top ten.
• Alien and Aliens share fifth place, with both movies receiving an IMDb rating of 8.4 and 533,000 worldwide searches a month.

As Halloween gets closer, many people will be going back to the horror movies they watch every October, while others will spend longer choosing something scary than they do actually watching it.

The choice is huge, from slashers and zombie movies to psychological thrillers and older black-and-white classics. However, some titles continue to be searched for and highly rated decades after they first frightened audiences.

With this in mind, Mahjong 4 Friends compared worldwide Google searches and IMDb audience ratings to find the most popular horror movies of all time, and perhaps help settle what deserves a place on this year’s Halloween watchlist.

Each movie received a popularity score based 60% on its average monthly worldwide searches and 40% on its IMDb rating. The final ranking included 342 movies with at least 50,000 audience votes and available search data.

The most popular horror movies worldwide

Rank	Movie	Year	IMDb rating	Worldwide searches per month	Popularity score
1	The Shining	1980	8.4	1,074,000	97.7
2	The Silence of the Lambs	1991	8.6	685,100	96.8
3	Nosferatu	1922	7.8	1,500,000	96.0
4	Halloween	1978	7.7	763,500	94.5
5	Alien	1979	8.4	533,000	94.4
5	Aliens	1986	8.4	533,000	94.4
7	Edward Scissorhands	1990	7.8	673,000	93.7
8	28 Days Later	2002	7.5	1,000,000	93.3
9	Train to Busan	2016	7.6	674,000	93.1
10	Psycho	1960	8.5	417,500	92.7

The Shining is named the most popular horror movie worldwide, receiving a score of 97.7 out of 99. The 1980 movie is searched for an average of 1,074,000 times a month and has an IMDb rating of 8.4. More than 1.2 million IMDb users have rated the movie, which gives it one of the largest voting audiences in the top ten. It is also one of just three entries in the table attracting at least one million relevant searches per month.

The Silence of the Lambs is the second most popular choice. It scores 96.8, with 685,100 monthly searches and the highest IMDb rating in the table at 8.6. Nearly 1.75 million people have rated the movie on IMDb, more than any other title in the top ten.

While the number of votes does not form part of the popularity score, it does show that the 8.6 rating comes from a particularly large audience. The rating itself, combined with its worldwide search total, is what places the movie second.

The biggest surprise in the ranking may be the original Nosferatu. The silent movie, released in 1922, takes third place with a score of 96.0 and attracts 1.5 million searches per month.

The 1922 original and Robert Eggers’ 2024 remake were considered separately in the study. However, because the two movies share the same title, recent interest in the remake may also have encouraged more people to search for Nosferatu generally. Even with that context, the original remains one of the oldest movies to appear anywhere near the top of the ranking.

Halloween ranks fourth with a score of 94.5. John Carpenter’s 1978 movie receives 763,500 relevant searches each month and holds a 7.7 rating on IMDb. Since “Halloween” is also the name of the holiday, the study did not automatically count every search for the word. Only searches identified as relating to the movie were used in the final ranking.

There is a tie in fifth place between Alien and Aliens, which both score 94.4. The two movies also share the same IMDb rating of 8.4 and each records 533,000 worldwide searches per month. The original Alien has received more IMDb votes, with just over one million compared with around 846,000 for its sequel. However, the figures used for the popularity score leave the two movies level.

Tim Burton’s Edward Scissorhands comes seventh at 93.7. It has a 7.8 IMDb rating and receives 673,000 searches a month. It is perhaps the least straightforward horror movie in the top ten, as it also falls into fantasy and romance. Even so, its gothic setting and darker moments place it among some much more traditional scary movies in the ranking.

28 Days Later takes eighth place, scoring 93.3. The zombie movie records one million worldwide searches each month, although its IMDb rating of 7.5 is the lowest among the top ten positions. Its search total is higher than every movie above it apart from Nosferatu and The Shining. This suggests that current interest has played a bigger part in its final position than its audience rating.

South Korean zombie movie Train to Busan follows in ninth place with a score of 93.1. It receives 674,000 monthly searches and has a 7.6 rating on IMDb. Released in 2016, it is the newest movie in the top ten and the only one from the past 15 years. It also narrowly receives more monthly searches than Edward Scissorhands, despite having a slightly lower IMDb rating.

Psycho rounds out the top ten at 92.7. Alfred Hitchcock’s 1960 movie has an IMDb rating of 8.5, the second highest in the table, and has been rated by more than 792,000 users. Its monthly search figure of 417,500 is the lowest in the top ten. However, the strength of its audience rating keeps it ahead of newer movies attracting more searches.

Other famous horror films also feature further down the ranking. The Exorcist places 19th, Get Out is 29th and Scream ranks 39th, while Jaws takes 54th place and A Nightmare on Elm Street comes 60th. The Babadook also makes the list in 80th place, with the full top 100 available in the table at the end of the release.

Neal Taparia, President of Mahjong 4 Friends, said: “Horror has a much longer shelf life than most types of film. A comedy can become very tied to the decade it was made in, and an action movie can start to look dated once the effects move on. Horror is a little different because the basic fears behind it tend not to change very much.

“Halloween also gives these movies a natural reason to return every year. People are not only looking for the newest release. They go back to something they already love, finally watch a classic they have heard about for years, or show an older movie to someone seeing it for the first time. That keeps the same titles moving between generations.

“Streaming has made that rediscovery much easier as well. An older movie can suddenly appear on a homepage or in a Halloween collection and find a new audience in a matter of days. A new sequel, remake, or trailer can do the same thing, as people often want to go back and see where the story or character began before watching the latest version.

“There is also something quite social about choosing a Halloween movie. The film has to be scary enough for some people without being too much for everyone else, so familiar titles often win. The movies that last are usually the ones people keep recommending, arguing about, and bringing back for one more watch each October.”