Picture: Netflix
Social media speculation about the age rating for Stranger Things is currently rampant. A new viral post has spotted that ahead of season 5 of Stranger Things dropping in 2025, the show has been bumped from a TV-14 to TV-MA but the reality is that it’s much more complicated and has been changing for a while now.
The Tweet comes from one of the many anonymous fan accounts set up for Stranger Things under the handle of Updates_SThings. While their intel is mostly good, some of their posts often come without sources or expanded details (that’s Twitter for you!). On November 26th, they posted a Tweet stating that the series had just been readjusted from TV-14 to TV-MA but didn’t specify when this happened. Many of the replies and quote retweets on the post that have been viewed over 300,000 times and have amassed over 4,000 likes seem to think so anyway.
What’s the truth here? It’s confusing and inconsistent over the past few years.
Ahead of the release of Season 4, CheatSheet reported that the show’s age rating had been bumped up to TV-MA, although they noted in an update a day later that the show had changed back to TV-14 for a period shortly thereafter. The difference is quite substantial. According to the Netflix support page, TV-14 means “Parents strongly cautioned. May not be suitable for ages under 14.” while TV-MA is the TV equivalent of the R rating, and while it doesn’t list an age range, it says “For Mature Audiences” only.
We then looked at our own data and contacted Maft from NewOnNetflix.info to double-check. The first batch of season 4 (that season was released in two parts) was indeed uploaded as TV-14, but the second batch was at the time listed as TV-MA. Since then, the show has regularly switched its age rating and has done so again in the last few months.
As it stands right now, the entire show is under TV-MA. However, you only have to roll it back to just February to see it’s only TV-14. That said, Stranger Things 4 currently lists the entirety of the season as TV-14, albeit with more warnings than the prior season. Season 4 features warnings for “Disturbing images, fear, gore, language, smoking,” while all the other seasons list “fear, gore, language, smoking.”
While it’s true that season 4 certainly upped the ante regarding violence on screen and more flavorful language in recent episodes, it also coincided with a note added by Netflix, which saw the first episode preceded by a message warning viewers of “graphic violence involving children.” That coincided with a devastating elementary school shooting in Texas that year.
Age Rating for Stranger Things Season 3
We spoke to a Netflix support agent who told us, “It can definitely be confusing when there are discrepancies in the content ratings on Netflix, especially when you see a show like Stranger Things listed as TV-MA (Mature Audiences) while the individual seasons and episodes show a TV-14 rating (which is more suitable for younger viewers, usually ages 14+).”
They added, “Netflix often applies a global rating to an entire show based on its overall content, but the individual episodes may have different ratings depending on the specific content in each episode. In the case of Stranger Things, the show might be listed as TV-MA to reflect some of the more mature themes across all episodes (like violence, language, and intense scenes). However, the individual episodes could be rated TV-14 based on the content of those specific episodes.”
Is all of this an indication for season 5? Some have certainly ascertained that. Officially, we don’t have an age rating for season 5 just yet (it’s not complete), but at the very least, it will definitely remain as TV-14 and we’ll keep you posted should we learn more.
Netflix Synopsis: "When a young boy vanishes, a small town uncovers a mystery involving secret experiments, terrifying supernatural forces and one strange little girl."
