The most-watched shows in the world right now

A live-action adaptation of a beloved animated series, plus a swoon-worthy, decades-spanning romantic drama, and a long-running Netflix reality series about romance. What do they all have in common? They’re among the biggest Netflix shows in the world right now, based on the latest data from the streamer’s regularly updated global Top 10 chart. It’s a ranking dominated, this week, by Avatar: The Last Airbender, an eight-episode action-adventure series from showrunner Albert Kim that got a splashy premiere in recent days at the Egyptian Theater in Hollywood.

As for the rest of the hottest Netflix shows in the world, the latest list is rounded out by other new and new-ish Netflix releases like the Jamie Dornan-led drama The Tourist, a new season of Love is Blind, and the Sofia Vergara-led cartel drama Griselda. And as we do each week, we’ll take a closer look at all of it below.

Netflix Top 10 shows (Feb. 19-Feb. 25)

This latest ranking represents the top 10 (English-language) Netflix shows in the world right now.

To learn more about some of the top series below, you can go deeper by checking out our coverage of several of the Netflix originals on this list, from the Sofia Vergara-led cartel drama Griselda to Love is Blind — the latter of which is the subject of a great new piece in The Wall Street Journal (titled “How ‘Love Is Blind’ Helped Netflix Crack the Reality-TV Code”) that I highly recommend.

For now, this week’s complete Top 10 includes:

1. Avatar: The Last Airbender — 21.2 million views
2. One Day — 7.5 million views
3. Love is Blind (Season 6) — 7.5 million views
4. Can I Tell You a Secret? — 6.5 million views
5. Griselda — 3.1 million views
6. Warrior (Season 1) — 3.1 million views
7. Mike Epps: Ready to Sell Out — 3 million views
8. Formula 1: Drive to Survive (Season 6) — 2.9 million views
9. Resident Alien (Season 1) — 2.2 million views
10. The Tourist (Season 1) — 2.1 million views

Next, let’s zero in on the biggest Netflix TV release in the world this week.

Avatar: The Last Airbender — #1 on Netflix

Making its debut on Netflix’s global Top 10 chart this week is the aforementioned Avatar: The Last Airbender, which was one of the most anticipated February streaming releases across all the major platforms.

The story: For the uninitiated, Avatar: The Last Airbender is a fantasy wherein the four nations of Water, Earth, Fire, and Air once lived in harmony — with a peace between them that’s maintained by the Avatar, the master of all four elements. The Fire nation, meanwhile, breaks that peace when it attacks and wipes out the Air Nomads en route to the fire benders trying to conquer the entire world.

Eventually, a young Air Nomad named Tang emerges to take his rightful place as the next Avatar, embarking on a fantastical quest to save the world.

Continues showrunner Kim in a Netflix promotional interview about the series, which is currently on the global Top 10 in 92 countries: “I was a huge fan of the original, and I got introduced to it through my daughter. It was her favorite show growing up so I used to watch it with her. But pretty soon I found I was watching it even without her.

“As for the live-action adaptation, when the opportunity came my way I remember thinking, I’m not sure I can improve upon the original. But then I realized it was less about improving upon it and more about introducing this incredible world to a new generation of viewers in a new way … Plus this was an opportunity to establish a new benchmark in representation, featuring Asian and Indigenous characters in a way we’d never seen in live action. That was an opportunity I couldn’t pass up.”