What To Watch
These 10 Summer Horror Movies Are a Killer Way to Beat the Heat
Why should fall have all the fun?
By Maggie Fremont and Erin Corbett
June 22, 2026
Best 10 Summer Horror Movies For a Killer Way to Beat the Heat - Netflix Tudum
If fall is the spooky season, summer is like the eve of spooky season. Even the trend of “Summerween” indicates broader acceptance that the warm months are a time to indulge in early Halloween decor shopping and watch scary movies. And if you think about it, the summer has plenty of creepy atmosphere. Swimming with sharks? Terrifying! Vacations gone wrong? Bone-chilling! Two weeks at summer camp? Very murder-y, actually!
Summer is full of things that go bump in the night — and in the broad, steamy daylight, too — that are sure to get your heart rate going and fix any craving you might have for a horror flick. If you’re looking for a few summer scaries to get by until fall brings the seriously petrifying stuff, Netflix has you covered. So, press play and put the aloe away, because these summer horror movies are guaranteed to give your sunburn the chills.
Fear Street Part 2: 1978
It’s happening again. The second film in the R.L. Stine Fear Street trilogy takes us back to Shadyside where, as we saw in Fear Street Part One: 1994, Deena (Kiana Madeira) and Josh (Benjamin Flores Jr.) are looking for a way to save Deena’s girlfriend, Sam (Olivia Scott Welch). The Shadyside witch has possessed Sam — and has been wreaking havoc on the town for centuries. Deena and Josh seek out the assistance of C. Berman (Gillian Jacobs), one of the only survivors of the 1978 Massacre at Camp Nightwing. C. Berman tells them the story of what happened that night at camp. Long story short: so much blood! Definitely at least one decapitation! Is that summer camp nostalgia tugging at your heartstrings or what?
Gerald's Game
Mike Flanagan’s 2017 horror film takes the idea of a getaway-gone-wrong and dials it up to 100. Married couple Jessie (Carla Gugino) and Gerald (Bruce Greenwood), looking to spice things up, head out of the city to their vacation home for a few days — but for Jessie, it turns into a complete nightmare. Gerald’s idea of “romance” is to handcuff his wife to the bed and attempt to enact a sexual assault fantasy. Things only get worse from there: Gerald has a heart attack and dies on top of her, leaving her trapped. It doesn’t take long for Jessie to become consumed by repressed memories, vivid hallucinations, and something extremely sinister and perhaps very real as she fights for survival. Gerald’s Game is an excellent addition to the psychological horror genre and contains an absolute master-class performance from Gugino.
I Know What You Did Last Summer
It’s the 4th of July once again in Southport, North Carolina, where, in 1997, the town was terrorized by a maniacal fisherman seeking revenge. High school best friends Ava (Chase Sui Wonders), Danica (Madelyn Cline), Milo (Jonah Hauer-King), and Teddy (Tyriq Withers) reunite for Danica and Teddy’s engagement party. After spotting their estranged friend Stevie (Sarah Pidgeon), they convince her to join them to watch fireworks at Reaper’s Curve. Teddy jokingly stands in the middle of the street, causing a car to swerve and fall off the cliff. The five swear each other to secrecy, but one year later, an ominous note turns up and shows that someone knows and isn’t going to let them get away with it. Familiar faces Jennifer Love Hewitt, Freddie Prinze Jr., and Sarah Michelle Gellar return in this new entry in the franchise.
Influencer
Nobody makes summer vacation look more glamorous than a social media influencer. Madison (Emily Tennant) is one such influencer, and she’s using a trip to Thailand as an opportunity to make content. Somewhat lonely since her boyfriend bailed on the trip at the last minute, Madison makes friends with CW (Cassandra Naud), a young woman who knows the area and offers to show her around. When Madison’s hotel room is broken into and her passport is stolen, CW invites her to stay at her place. She takes Madison to an island that only she knows about, but after a night of drinking around the campfire, Madison wakes up on the beach to find CW has left her alone. And CW’s twisted plan is just getting started.
In the Tall Grass
You can practically smell summer when you see wind whipping through that grassy green Kansas field — but leave it to Stephen King and Joe Hill, who wrote the novella that In the Tall Grass is based on, to make that idyllic notion as scary as possible. While traveling through Kansas on their way to San Diego, siblings Becky (Laysla De Oliveira) and Cal (Avery Whitted) hear a boy yelling for help in the grassy field right off the road. They head into the field to offer their help and wind up fighting for their lives. Becky and Cal quickly learn that in the tall grass you can’t trust other people, your own senses, or even the ground beneath your feet. It’ll make you rethink the phrase “I’m just stepping outside for a little fresh air.”
IT'S WHAT'S INSIDE
Ah, weddings and college-friend reunions. These two summer-friendly events are perfectly used by It’s What’s Inside writer and director Greg Jardin to get his cast of characters together in the same house for a body-swap horror adventure. This group of old friends are already locked and loaded with a whole bunch of hang-ups and jealousies when they arrive at Reuben’s (Devon Terrell) house the night before his wedding, all of which cleverly get exacerbated when their friend Forbes (David Thompson) shows up with a machine that allows them to swap into each other’s bodies. Not surprisingly, this little game goes wrong pretty quickly. The highly stylized film manages to keep the paranoia chugging along while also offering up a satire on Gen Z insecurities.
Leave the World Behind
If straight horror isn’t your thing, but you’re still looking for a summer movie that spends its entire runtime filling you with dread and anxiety, Leave the World Behind –– starring Julia Roberts, Mahershala Ali, and Ethan Hawke –– is for you. Equal parts social commentary and psychological thriller, the movie, directed by Sam Esmail and based on the novel by Rumaan Alam, follows the Sandfords as matriarch Amanda (Roberts) plans an impromptu vacation for her family. It’s supposed to be all relaxation, beach time, and family hangouts, but almost immediately things go haywire: The internet is down, there are widespread blackouts, and no one really knows what’s going on in the outside world except for the fact that society is imploding. Add to that chaos the fact that when the blackouts first start, the owner of the house the Sandfords are staying in — Ali’s G.H. Scott — and his daughter (Myha’la) want to seek safety in their own home, throwing Amanda (and her biases) off-kilter.
Nope
Summer is perfect for theme parks, but Jupiter’s Claim is one you might want to avoid. The Haywood family runs a horse ranch outside of Los Angeles. When Otis Haywood Sr. dies under strange circumstances, his children Otis Jr. “OJ” (Daniel Kaluuya) and Emerald “Em” (Keke Palmer) struggle to keep the ranch afloat. OJ is forced to sell some of their horses to Ricky “Jupe” Park (Steven Yeun), the owner of Jupiter’s Claim, a Western-themed amusement park near the ranch. One night, OJ goes to investigate a horse that’s run away and sees something in the sky. Believing there is a UFO, Em devises a plan to capture it on camera to make money. Jupe has his own designs on the UFO. But none of them truly grasp the danger they are in.
Texas Chainsaw Massacre
If you’re thinking about quintessential summer horror movies, the original Texas Chainsaw Massacre must be high on the list — it’s a classic. Set 50 years after Leatherface’s original summer of ’73 murder spree, the 2022 sequel finds that pesky guy with the big power tool back at it. This time, he’s after a new group of young adults (the cast includes Elsie Fisher and Sarah Yarkin), as well as Sally (Olwen Fouéré), the sole survivor of the 1973 killings — now a Texas Ranger looking for payback. It’s a new year with new victims, but the same old Leatherface.
Under Paris
Ah, the City of Light! Paris sure got to show off its sparkle during the 2024 Olympics, didn’t it? Well, what if the city was under attack by giant killer sharks that have adapted to live in the Seine? That’s Under Paris. Terrifying shark movies are a tried-and-true staple of summer horror, and in this take on the genre, you even get a little environmentalism thrown in for good measure. Here, Bérénice Bejo stars as Sophia, a marine biologist who must work to save Paris from the same giant shark that killed her entire team — including her husband — three years prior while trying to study the effects of the Great Pacific garbage patch. Now that shark is back, deadlier than ever, and a triathlon is about to fill the river with a buffet of unsuspecting swimmers.
Additional reporting by Ananda Dillon.
Horror Movies to Stream NowFrom horror-comedies to classic hauntings, these movies will creep you out.
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