Shows Like The X-Files
If you loved The X-Files's Mystery and Sci-Fi & Fantasy storytelling, these series deliver a similar experience — chosen for tone, narrative quality, and viewer satisfaction. Each includes where to stream it now.
★ Top Picks

Fringe
FBI Special Agent Olivia Dunham, brilliant but formerly institutionalized scientist Walter Bishop and his scheming, reluctant son Peter uncover a deadly mystery involving a series of unbelievable events and realize they may be a part of a larger, more disturbing pattern that blurs the line between science fiction and technology.

Millennium
A retired FBI serial-profiler joins the mysterious Millennium Group, a team of underground ex-law enforcement experts dedicated to fighting against the ever-growing forces of evil and darkness in the world.

Project Blue Book
A chronicle of the true top secret U.S. Air Force-sponsored investigations into UFO-related phenomena in the 1950s and ’60s, known as “Project Blue Book”.

The Blacklist
Raymond "Red" Reddington, one of the FBI's most wanted fugitives, surrenders in person at FBI Headquarters in Washington, D.C. He claims that he and the FBI have the same interests: bringing down dangerous criminals and terrorists. In the last two decades, he's made a list of criminals and terrorists that matter the most but the FBI cannot find because it does not know they exist. Reddington calls this "The Blacklist". Reddington will co-operate, but insists that he will speak only to Elizabeth Keen, a rookie FBI profiler.

Criminal Minds
An elite team of FBI profilers analyze the country's most twisted criminal minds, anticipating their next moves before they strike again. The Behavioral Analysis Unit's most experienced agent is David Rossi, a founding member of the BAU who returns to help the team solve new cases.

The Following
Notorious serial killer Joe Carroll, after being found guilty of murdering 14 female students on the Virginia college campus where he taught literature, escapes from death row. The FBI calls former agent Ryan Hardy to consult on the case, as he was the one responsible for Carroll’s capture in 2003. Ryan, working closely with an FBI team, including Mike Weston and FBI Specialist Debra Parker, piece together the ever-growing web of murders orchestrated by the devious Carroll.

Threshold
Threshold was a science fiction drama television series that first aired on CBS in September 2005. Produced by Brannon Braga, David S. Goyer and David Heyman, the series focuses on a secret government project investigating the first contact with an extraterrestrial species.

Taken
The show takes place from 1944 to 2002 and follows the lives of three families: the Crawfords, who seek to cover up the Roswell crash and the existence of aliens; the Keys, who are subject to frequent experimentation by the aliens; and the Clarkes, who sheltered one of the surviving aliens from the crash.
More Shows Like The X-Files

CIA
When by-the-book FBI Special Agent Bill Goodman is loaned out to a clandestine CIA/FBI task force, he finds himself teamed up with secretive and roguish CIA case officer Colin Glass. Together they work covert operations in New York, uncovering international plots, terrorist cells, and geopolitical secrets.

Wiseguy
Vinnie Terranova does time in a New Jersey penitentiary to set up his undercover role as an agent for the OCB (Organized Crime Bureau) of the United States. His roots in a traditional Italian city neighborhood form the underlying dramatic base throughout the series, bringing him into conflict with his conservative mother and other family members while acting undercover as syndicate enforcer.

Stitchers
A young woman is recruited into a secret government agency to be “stitched” into the minds of the recently deceased, using their memories to investigate murders.

Unsolved Mysteries
Combines four to five segments of dramatic re-enactments, interviews and updates of real human and paranormal mysteries. An audience interactive call-to-action request allowed viewers to call in with tips to help solve the cases.

Torchwood
The exploits of a team of people whose job is to investigate the unusual, the strange and the extraterrestrial.

Debris
Two federal agents from two different continents, and two different mindsets, must work together to investigate when wreckage from a destroyed alien spacecraft has mysterious effects on humankind.

Eleventh Hour
Dr. Jacob Hood is a brilliant biophysicist and special science advisor to the government who investigates scientific crises and oddities. His crusade is to protect the substance of science against those who would abuse and misuse scientific discoveries for their own gain.

Ghost Hunters
Paranormal investigators investigate places that are reported to be haunted. Engaging forensic experts, historical records and the most innovative technology available, the squad helps everyday people who are struggling with unexplained supernatural phenomena.

Crisis
When Washington's most powerful players are pulled into an international conspiracy, an unlikely puppeteer will bring everyone from CEOs to The President of the United States to their knees by threatening the things they hold most dear.

Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders
Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders is a drama about the specialized International Division of the FBI tasked with solving crimes and coming to the rescue of Americans who find themselves in danger while abroad.

Sleepy Hollow
Ichabod Crane is resurrected and pulled two and a half centuries through time to unravel a mystery that dates all the way back to the founding fathers.
Why These Shows Are Similar
These recommendations share core qualities with The X-Files (1993): Mystery and Sci-Fi & Fantasy themes, similar pacing, and comparable production quality. NoBadPicks uses TMDB collaborative filtering, genre matching, and AI analysis to surface series most likely to resonate with fans of The X-Files.
See full details for The X-Files (1993)
