Stranger Things season 5 budget exceeds Avengers Endgame making it Netflix’s most expensive series ever

Netflix’s Stranger Things is preparing to conclude its story with a record-breaking budget, reportedly surpassing that of Marvel’s Avengers: Endgame, according to Puck News. The fifth and final season of the hit sci-fi series is said to have cost between $50 million and $60 million per episode, totaling an estimated $480 million in production costs.

For comparison, Avengers: Endgame—one of the most expensive films ever made—had a reported budget of around $356 million, making the latest season of Stranger Things a significantly larger investment for Netflix. The platform appears to be banking on the show’s massive global fanbase as it wraps up the Hawkins saga.

The final season will be released in three parts during the 2025 holiday season. Volume 1, featuring four episodes, debuts on November 26, followed by Volume 2 on December 25, and the concluding episode on December 31. Each installment will reportedly run between 90 minutes and two hours, giving the finale an almost cinematic scale.

Since its 2016 debut, Stranger Things has grown from a nostalgic sci-fi drama inspired by classics like IT, A Nightmare on Elm Street, and Carrie into one of Netflix’s defining franchises. The streaming giant spent roughly $270 million on Season 4, which became one of its most-watched releases.

The show’s star-studded cast—including Millie Bobby Brown, David Harbour, Finn Wolfhard, and Winona Ryder—returns for the final confrontation with Vecna. While it remains to be seen if Stranger Things 5 will achieve the same cultural impact as Endgame, its unprecedented budget signals Netflix’s ambition to deliver a grand finale worthy of the global phenomenon.