Thanksgiving falls on Thursday, November 26, 2026, and if your plan for the long weekend is dinner, leftovers, and a movie marathon, Hulu has you covered better than you might expect. It does not have the deepest Thanksgiving shelf of any streamer — the holiday has always made fewer movies than Christmas — but it has the essentials: one genuine Thanksgiving classic, a Hulu Original rom-com, the best Thanksgiving horror movie of the last few years, and a stack of all-time great Thanksgiving TV episodes. Every movie and episode below was checked against Hulu’s US catalog in October 2026. One honest warning before the list: streaming catalogs rotate, and licensed titles can leave with little notice, so it is worth pressing play before Thanksgiving week rather than assuming a title will still be there on the day.
Family Favorites and Feel-Good Picks
Home for the Holidays (1995). If you only watch one Thanksgiving movie on Hulu, make it this one. Directed by Jodie Foster, it stars Holly Hunter as a recently fired single mom who flies home to Baltimore for Thanksgiving with her gloriously dysfunctional family — Anne Bancroft and Charles Durning as her parents, Robert Downey Jr. as her chaotic brother, and Dylan McDermott as his friend along for the ride. It is funny, a little bruising, and completely honest about how a family dinner can go sideways, which is exactly why so many people rewatch it every single year. This is the gold standard for Thanksgiving family dramedies, and it is the anchor of Hulu’s lineup.
Free Birds (2013). The kids’ pick. Owen Wilson and Woody Harrelson voice two turkeys who get pardoned, steal a time machine, and travel back to the first Thanksgiving to get turkey off the menu permanently. It is silly in the best way, moves fast, and gives younger viewers a Thanksgiving story that is actually about Thanksgiving instead of a Christmas movie wearing a turkey hat. Parents get enough jokes aimed over the kids’ heads to stay awake through it.
Happiest Season (2020). This Hulu Original rom-com stars Kristen Stewart and Mackenzie Davis, with Aubrey Plaza, Alison Brie, Dan Levy, and Mary Steenburgen rounding out the cast. Davis plays Harper, who brings her partner Abby home for the holidays — without mentioning that she has not come out to her parents, forcing Abby to pose as her roommate. It is technically the start of the Christmas season rather than Thanksgiving itself, but the home-for-the-holidays, meet-the-family chaos is exactly the post-dinner vibe, and it works perfectly as the bridge movie between Thanksgiving night and the Christmas catalog.
Comedies for After Dinner
The Binge (2020). A Hulu Original comedy with a simple high-concept hook: in a near-future America, alcohol and drugs are illegal all year except for one 12-hour window called the Binge. Three friends (Skyler Gisondo, Dexter Darden, and Eduardo Franco) set out to make the most of their first one while Vince Vaughn, as an unhinged principal and overprotective dad, tries to stop them. It is not Thanksgiving-themed, but it is the right kind of loud, dumb, crowd-pleasing comedy for the Friday after the feast, once the kids are asleep and the group chat wants something nobody has to think hard about.
Thanksgiving Horror: Save These for After Dark
Thanksgiving (2023). Eli Roth turned his fake Grindhouse trailer into a real slasher, and it became the definitive Thanksgiving horror movie. After a Black Friday sale at a Plymouth, Massachusetts superstore turns into a deadly riot, a killer in a John Carver pilgrim mask starts picking off the people involved, one holiday-themed murder at a time. Patrick Dempsey plays the sheriff, and the cast includes Nell Verlaque, Milo Manheim, and Addison Rae. It is gory, funny, and genuinely well made — and it landed on Hulu in August 2025, so it is ready for your holiday horror slot. If your family tradition includes one scary movie after the pumpkin pie, this is the one.
Pilgrim (2019). Hulu’s own Thanksgiving horror entry, from the Blumhouse anthology series Into the Dark (you will find it listed under that series on Hulu). A mother hoping to teach her blended family some gratitude hires a troupe of pilgrim reenactors to join their Thanksgiving — and the reenactors take their commitment to 1620s values far, far too seriously. It runs a tight 80 minutes, builds dread nicely, and delivers the rare holiday horror story built entirely around the Thanksgiving table. A great double feature with Thanksgiving above.
The Best Thanksgiving TV Episodes on Hulu
Some of the best Thanksgiving viewing on Hulu is not movies at all. Sitcoms have been doing Thanksgiving episodes for decades, and Hulu holds several of the all-time greats:
- Bob’s Burgers — “Turkey in a Can” (Season 4, Episode 5). Bob’s Thanksgiving turkeys keep ending up in the toilet, and he is determined to catch the culprit in the most Bob way possible. The Belchers treat Thanksgiving as their biggest holiday, and this is the episode that proves why.
- How I Met Your Mother — “Slapsgiving” (Season 3, Episode 9). Marshall and Lily host their first Thanksgiving as a married couple while Barney sweats out the slap-bet countdown clock. Follow it with “Slapsgiving 2: Revenge of the Slap” (Season 5, Episode 10) for the full tradition.
- Modern Family — “Three Turkeys” (Season 6, Episode 8). Phil takes over the turkey, Claire secretly makes a backup, and Jay and Gloria hide in their own house after lying about traveling. Three turkeys, zero chill — peak Thanksgiving stress comedy.
- Brooklyn Nine-Nine — “Thanksgiving” (Season 1, Episode 10). Amy hosts the precinct at her apartment, the food is terrible, Jake would rather work a case, and it all still lands somewhere warm. A perfect 22-minute palate cleanser between movies.
- Cheers — “Thanksgiving Orphans” (Season 5, Episode 9). The bar’s lonely regulars gather at Carla’s house for a dinner that collapses into TV’s most famous food fight. It is over 40 years old and still makes greatest-episode lists for a reason.
- It’s Always Sunny in Philadelphia — “The Gang Squashes Their Beefs” (Season 9, Episode 10). The Gang invites every enemy they have ever made to Thanksgiving dinner to bury the hatchet. It goes exactly as badly as you would expect. For adults only, obviously.
The One Big Title That Is Not on Hulu
Quick heads-up so you do not waste time searching: Planes, Trains and Automobiles (1987), the Steve Martin and John Candy classic that most people consider the greatest Thanksgiving movie ever made, is not on Hulu this year — it is streaming on Paramount+ instead. The same goes for A Charlie Brown Thanksgiving, which lives on Apple TV+. Hulu’s own list above is strong, but if your family tradition demands Neal and Del, you will need the other subscription for one night.
One More Option: The Hulu Thanksgiving Collection
Every November, Hulu also rounds its holiday titles up into a Thanksgiving collection page inside the app, mixing the movies above with Thanksgiving episodes from shows across its catalog — family sitcoms, animated series, and a few cooking specials. It is worth browsing even if you start with this list, because the collection usually surfaces episodes buried deep in long-running series that search does not show well. If your household includes younger kids, the animated Thanksgiving episodes in that collection are a safer bet than anything in the horror section above, and they are short enough to run during the chaos of getting dinner on the table. Between the collection, the six movies, and the sitcom episodes listed here, you can fill the entire four-day weekend without ever leaving the app.
How to Watch: A Quick Game Plan
Everything on this list is included with a standard Hulu subscription in the US — Pilgrim is filed under the Into the Dark anthology series rather than as a standalone movie, so search the series name if it does not appear on its own. Our suggested schedule: Free Birds with the kids before dinner, Home for the Holidays as the main event after, a sitcom episode or two during the leftovers lull, and Thanksgiving or Pilgrim once the house quiets down. And one last reminder: licensed movies rotate off Hulu at the end of each month, so if a title on this list matters to your tradition, watch it earlier in November rather than saving everything for the night itself.
Founder & Editor at Durofy
