How to watch the X-Men movies in order
- Oops!Something went wrong.Please try again later.
Deadpool 3 is bringing the X-Men series back to our screens this summer, as well as one of its biggest characters: Hugh Jackman's Wolverine.
As we all wait to find out just how Wolverine is alive in the MCU movie, the upcoming release might have you nostalgic for a rewatch of the entire X-Men movie series so you primed for any surprise cameos that await in Deadpool & Wolverine.
You could choose to watch the X-Men movies in release date order, which would be pretty straightforward. However, if you want to be truly dedicated and watch the movies in timeline chronological order, it's not the easiest task.
We've put together a comprehensive guide on the best order in which to watch the movies, even taking the timeline divergence into account. It'll make sense when you see it, honest.
(While we've got you, were you looking for Star Wars' timeline? We've got that covered. MCU movies in order? Help yourself. What about DC Comics movies' chronological order? Easy peasy.)
What is the correct order of X-Men movies?
There's not really a definitive answer to the correct order to watch X-Men movies. If the question was 'What is the easiest way?', then we'd absolutely say watch all 13 X-Men movies in release order.
However, with multiple timelines, you could argue that the correct order is to watch in chronological order as best you can, jumping between timelines or just focusing on a particular timeline.
Really, it's just whatever you have the most patience for. Either way, you've got to watch the worst the X-Men series has to offer. (We're looking at you, The New Mutants.)
How to watch the X-Men movies in release order
Let's start with the simple approach to rewatching all 13 X-Men movies released to date, and that is in the order that they were released in cinemas.
If that's your approach (and we don't blame you if it is), here are all 13 X-Men movies in release order:
• X-Men (July 2000)
• X2 (May 2003)
• X-Men: The Last Stand (May 2006)
• X-Men Origins: Wolverine (May 2009)
• X-Men: First Class (June 2011)
• The Wolverine (July 2013)
• X-Men: Days of Future Past (May 2014)
• Deadpool (February 2016)
• X-Men: Apocalypse (May 2016)
• Logan (March 2017)
• Deadpool 2 (May 2018)
• Dark Phoenix (June 2019)
• The New Mutants (August 2020)
X-Men timeline: How to watch X-Men movies in chronological order
But if you want to watch in chronological order, buckle up as thanks to X-Men: Days of Future Past, there are two timelines in the series.
So unless you want to have a two-screen setup, you'll probably have to run through one timeline in full, and then loop back on yourself to pick up with the other timeline. The two Deadpool movies can be watched in either timeline.
Understood? Then let's get cracking.
1. X-Men: First Class
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
In 1962, Charles Xavier (James McAvoy) and his childhood friend Raven Darkholme/Mystique (Jennifer Lawrence) meet holocaust survivor and fellow mutant Magneto (Michael Fassbender) for the first time.
They form the original X-Men team and help avert disaster during the Cuban Missile Crisis, but Mystique and Magneto disagree with Professor X about the future of mutantkind and abandon him. A stray bullet hits Charles and paralyses him.
2. X-Men: Days of Future Past
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
In 1973, military scientist Bolivar Trask (Peter Dinklage) creates an army of robot 'Sentinels' to control the perceived mutant threat.
Xavier, Beast (Nicholas Hoult) and Quicksilver (Evan Peters) break Magneto out of his prison under the Pentagon, while Mystique attempts to assassinate Trask after discovering that he has been experimenting on mutants.
— TIMELINE DIVERGENCE ALERT —
X-Men movies in order: Timeline A, explained
Mystique fails. She is captured and experimented on (oh the irony), which leads decades later to the development of adaptive Sentinels that will eventually drive mutants to the edge of extinction.
3a. X-Men Origins: Wolverine
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
We meet Logan (Hugh Jackman) who was born in a remote part of Canada in the 1800s. He and his half-brother Victor/Sabretooth (Liev Schreiber) fight in wars throughout the 20th century and are eventually recruited into the military mutant squad Team X, led by William Stryker.
Logan grows disillusioned with the team and quits, but is later tricked into having adamantium bonded to his bones in order to help him capture a rogue Sabretooth. He avoids being turned into a mindless weapon, defeats the military's 'Mutant Killer', but ends up with amnesia thanks to a bullet in the brain.
4a. X-Men
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
Wolverine meets a young mutant with uncontrollable powers called Rogue (Anna Paquin). They are rescued from an attack by Magneto (now Ian McKellen) and his 'Brotherhood of Mutants' by Xavier (now Patrick Stewart) and his new X-Men team.
Logan falls for Jean Grey (Famke Janssen), argues with Cyclops (James Marsden), Storm (Halle Berry) electrocutes a toad, and they foil Magneto's plan to turn the world's leaders into mutants.
5a. X2
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
The military's anti-mutant nutjob William Stryker (Brian Cox) returns and attacks Xavier's school with the help of his mind-controlling mutant son, Jason.
Wolverine discovers some secrets about his past with Stryker and joins forces with Magneto – who Mystique has busted out of jail. They prevent Stryker from forcing Xavier to kill all the mutants on Earth with his powers. Jean is believed dead after staying behind to let the rest of the X-Men escape.
6a. X-Men: The Last Stand
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
Jean returns under the control of her powerful and psychotic alternate personality, 'Phoenix'. She kills Cyclops and Xavier and teams up with Magneto.
The creation of a 'mutant cure' leads to a climactic battle on Alcatraz between Magneto's allies and the X-Men. Magneto is robbed of his powers and Jean convinces Wolverine to kill her. The cure is destroyed, although it is hinted that Magneto's powers are returning and Xavier has been resurrected.
7a. The Wolverine
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
Logan lives as a hermit in the remote Canadian wilderness, tormented by the death of Jean Grey.
Contacted by a man whose life he saved during the World War II bombing of Nagasaki, Wolverine heads to Japan, where he is drawn into a plot to steal his healing factor.
8a. X-Men: Days of Future Past (future sequence)
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
In a future where mutants are almost extinct, the Sentinels have the X-Men on the run. Kitty Pryde (Elliot Page) sends Wolverine's consciousness back into his younger body in 1973 in order to prevent their horrible future from happening. Which is when you get…
X-Men movies in order: Timeline B, explained
3b. X-Men: Days of Future Past (past sequence)
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
Logan prevents Mystique from killing Trask and being captured, creating a new timeline where Sentinels will not eradicate mutantkind (future Wolverine finds himself back in Xavier's mansion in his 'present', with all his X-Men friends still alive).
Mystique saves President Nixon from Magneto and is hailed as a hero, altering public opinion of mutants. The Wolverine of 1973 is captured by a young Stryker (Josh Helman).
4b. X-Men: Apocalypse
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
In 1983, Mystique has become a legend to mutantkind. She reluctantly becomes leader of the X-Men to help fight the ancient mutant Apocalypse (Oscar Isaac), who has transformed Magneto into one of his Horsemen minions (no horses included) after the former villain's family was murdered.
Stryker captures the team and the young, new X-Men Jean (Sophie Turner), Cyclops (Tye Sheridan) and Nightcrawler (Kodi Smit McPhee) set out to rescue them, releasing a savage, apparently mindless Wolverine in the process. Apocalypse attempts to steal Xavier's body, but Jean transforms into the Phoenix and destroys him.
5b. Dark Phoenix
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
X-Men: Dark Phoenix offers a fresh take on Jean Grey's corruption by the Phoenix, which begins after a mission into space goes awry and Jean absorbs a cosmic force that she can't control.
Following the pattern of recent movies, it's set in the 1990s (1992 to be precise, with a prologue set in 1975) slotting it in between the '80s of Apocalypse and Deadpool's more modern adventures.
6b. Deadpool
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
Sometime in the 21st century, motor-mouthed mercenary Wade Wilson (Ryan Reynolds) falls in love with a sex worker called Vanessa (Morena Baccarin). Discovering that he has terminal cancer, he accepts an experimental cure to awaken his latent mutant genes.
Surviving horrible torture and a murder attempt, the now disfigured Wade (aka Deadpool) teams up with some B-list X-Men (sorry, guys) to defeat his nemesis Ajax (Ed Skrein).
7b. Deadpool 2
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
Reynolds' sequel gives every appearance of being set in the modern day, not long after the previous entry, and includes cameos that cement it in the new timeline.
However, thanks to Cable's time machine and a post-credits sequence that cheekily crosses over into the old timeline, things could get very confusing in the future. Director David Leitch has admitted that they "never had a lot of conversations" about how the timeline works.
8b. The New Mutants
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
In truth, you could place The New Mutants in either timeline as it's mostly separate from everything that's come before. It's "contemporary timeless" according to producer Karen Rosenfelt and "completely its own thing" according to director Josh Boone. Helpful!
The story follows a group of young mutants who are being held in a secret facility and must learn to master their powers when they face a terrifying threat. We likely won't see them again in the future, despite the original plan for future movies (sorry guys).
Given that there is a sort-of Logan connection as we see glimpses of the facility where X-23 was created, we're going to put The New Mutants in this timeline. In all honesty, though, watch it wherever you want to.
9b. X-Men: Days of Future Past (future sequence)
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
Yep, this movie again. After Logan saves the day, he wakes up back in 2023 at the X-Men mansion to find all of his friends alive and well. So that's nice.
10b. Logan
Watch Now: iTunes | Prime Video | Disney+
An ageing Professor X loses control of his powers, killing most of the X-Men, and a sinister government plot suppresses the X-gene through the distribution of genetically modified corn, essentially leading to the eradication of all mutants.
In 2029, Wolverine is working as a chauffeur while trying to look after 97-year-old Xavier. When he comes into contact with a little girl, Laura (Dafne Keen) created from his DNA, he goes on a quest to find a safe refuge for them. Xavier and Logan don't survive the trip, but they do at least manage to lead a new generation of young mutants, including Laura, to freedom.
You Might Also Like
