Movies like Criteria One (2016)
The best movies like Criteria One (2016) are Monolith (2023), 2073 (2024) and Surrogates (2009). If Criteria One hooked you with its science fiction and thriller, these 30 similar films are what to watch next, and every pick says why it matches.
Quick picks
- Highest ratedUpgrade (2018)7.5/10 from 5,378 votes
- NewestDisclosure Day (2026)Released 2026
Monolith (2023)
A desperate young journalist turns to podcasting to salvage her career, but her rush to make headlines leads her to an alien conspiracy.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like this2073 (2024)
Inspired by Chris Marker's iconic 1962 featurette La Jetée; the year is 2073—a not-so-distant dystopian future—and the setting is New San Francisco, the scorched-earth tech-dominant police state where democracy and personal freedom have been well and truly obliterated.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSurrogates (2009)
Set in a futuristic world where humans live in isolation and interact through surrogate robots, a cop is forced to leave his home for the first time in years in order to investigate the murders of others' surrogates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisCruel & Unusual (2014)
Wrongly condemned for killing his wife, a man finds himself in a mysterious institution where he is sentenced to relive her death for eternity.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisImpostor (2001)
A top-secret government weapons designer is arrested by a clandestine government organization on suspicion of being a clone created by the hostile alien race wanting to take over Earth.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & thriller
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisProdigy (2017)
Jimmy is a committed child psychologist who uses his own playbook, but when he is brought in to work with Ellie, he is completely unprepared for his subject—a 9-year-old psychopathic genius with nothing to lose. As he begins to understand the extent of her capabilities and the fate that has been planned for her, he struggles to overcome her defenses before it is too late for them both.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisDisclosure Day (2026)
A cybersecurity expert becomes a whistleblower after uncovering secrets about aliens, putting him on the run from a corporation. Meanwhile, a meteorologist experiencing strange phenomena joins forces with him to prove there's life beyond our understanding.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisCompanion (2025)
During a weekend getaway at a secluded lakeside estate, a group of friends finds themselves entangled in a web of secrets, deception, and advanced technology. As tensions rise and loyalties are tested, they uncover unsettling truths about themselves and the world around them.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisGemini Man (2019)
Henry Brogan is an elite 51-year-old assassin who's ready to call it quits after completing his 72nd job. His plans get turned upside down when he becomes the target of a mysterious operative who can seemingly predict his every move. To his horror, Brogan soon learns that the man who's trying to kill him is a younger, faster, cloned version of himself.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisUpgrade (2018)
A brutal mugging leaves Grey Trace paralyzed in the hospital and his beloved wife dead. A billionaire inventor soon offers Trace a cure — an artificial intelligence implant called STEM that will enhance his body. Now able to walk, Grey finds that he also has superhuman strength and agility — skills he uses to seek revenge against the thugs who destroyed his life.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both thriller & science fiction
Worth the HypeMovies like thisInvasion of the Body Snatchers (1956)
A small-town doctor learns that the population of his community is being replaced by emotionless alien duplicates.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & thriller
Worth the HypeMovies like thisSpace/Time (2025)
After a fatal test shuts down their project, a disgraced team of scientists enters the criminal underworld to rebuild a forbidden space-bending engine that could rescue humanity or annihilate it entirely.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction & thriller
SnoozefestMovies like thisHow to Talk to Girls at Parties (2017)
In 1970s London, a teenage outsider named Enn falls in love with a rebellious alien girl named Zan, who has come to Earth for a party. Together, they navigate the complexities of intergalactic culture and the trials of first love.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe History of Future Folk (2012)
An alien intending to claim Earth for his people before their homeworld is destroyed by a comet decides not to eliminate humanity when he hears their music. Instead, he lives among them until another alien is sent to find and kill him.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Wild Blue Yonder (2005)
An alien narrates the story of his dying planet, his and his people's visitations to Earth and Earth's self-made demise, while human astronauts in space are attempting to find an alternate planet for surviving humans to live on.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisPsycho Goreman (2020)
Siblings Mimi and Luke unwittingly resurrect an ancient alien overlord. Using a magical amulet, they force the monster to obey their childish whims, and accidentally attract a rogues’ gallery of intergalactic assassins to small-town suburbia.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Brother from Another Planet (1984)
A mute alien with the appearance of a black human is chased by outer-space bounty hunters through the streets of Harlem.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisSnatchers (2019)
After status-obsessed teen Sara has sex for the first time, she wakes up the next day nine months pregnant-with an alien.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisEarth to Echo (2014)
After a construction project begins digging in their neighbourhood, best friends Tuck, Munch and Alex inexplicably begin to receive strange, encoded messages on their cell phones. Convinced something bigger is going on, they go to their parents and the authorities. The three embark on a secret adventure to crack the code and follow it to its source, and discover a mysterious being from another world who desperately needs their help. The journey that follows will change all their lives forever.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisRim of the World (2019)
Stranded at a summer camp when aliens attack the planet, four teens with nothing in common embark on a perilous mission to save the world.
Why it matches: Recommended by TMDB viewers · both science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Shadow Men (1997)
An innocent family outing becomes an exercise in terror when a blinding light from the sky descends on the Wilsons - Bob, Dez, and their son Andy, rendering them unconscious. They awake the following morning with no memory of the incident, yet they are all plagued by images of extraterrestrials and inexplicable anxiety.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction & thriller
Monsters (2010)
Six years ago NASA discovered the possibility of alien life within our solar system. A probe was launched to collect samples, but crashed upon re-entry over Central America. Soon after, new life forms began to appear and half of Mexico was quarantined as an infected zone. Today, the American and Mexican military still struggle to contain "the creatures," while a journalist agrees to escort a shaken tourist through the infected zone in Mexico to the safety of the U.S. border.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller & science fiction
Popcorn FlickMovies like thisThe Phoenix Incident (2015)
A number of 'missing person' cases are reported in Phoenix, Arizona when an unexplained light appears in the sky one night in 1997.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both thriller & science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisThe Hunt (2006)
Bow hunting enthusiast Jack Hamberg, his eight-year old stepson Clint and former news cameraman Atticus Monroe are on a mission to make a deer hunting video. All that is needed to complete the video is a "kill". Jack and Atticus reluctantly decide to trespass onto a nearby property where there may be more abundant prey. Once inside the restricted area, they come upon some frightening realizations. The hunters have become the hunted.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction & thriller
Zolar (2004)
Extreme athlete Jordan Hoffart shows off his prowess in this full-length movie featuring the blue-hued alien Zolar -- son of Sylvester "Skip" Crovo -- whom wanna-be skateboarding superstars recruit to teach them how to ride a board like the pros. When they meet Zolar, their newest team member, the kids have to get over their initial prejudice and learn how to hang with someone physically unlike them but just as dedicated to the sport as they are.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
Alien Express (2005)
A new super train is built when a meteorite crashes near by, releasing a tiny creature. Once it kills and consumes everyone on board the train, it begins to grow and multiply into hordes of different creatures.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
Battle of Los Angeles (2011)
In February 1942 US forces engaged an unidentified flying object above Los Angeles. Now almost 70 years later, the alien invaders have returned.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisInvisible Invaders (1959)
Aliens, contacting scientist Adam Penner, inform him that they have been on the moon for twenty thousand years, undetected due to their invisibility, and have now decided to annihilate humanity unless all the nations of earth surrender immediately. Sequestered in an impregnable laboratory trying to find the aliens' weakness, Penner, his daughter, a no-nonsense army major and a squeamish scientist are attacked from outside by the aliens, who have occupied the bodies of the recently deceased.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisCreature (1985)
A crew of scientists arrives on a far, cold planet to examine archaic artifacts of unknown origin. They discover that their German enemies already have a ship there. When they seek their help after a failed landing, they only find the Germans’ bodies, obviously slaughtered by one of the archaic creatures, awoken to new life. Now the alien is after them.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
SnoozefestMovies like thisAlien Avengers (1996)
Charlie and Rhonda are a sweet and comfortable married couple on vacation with their lovely daughter Daphne. They find a rundown boarding house and its haggard owner, Joseph, an ex-con whose mother has just died and left him the property. He doesn't know why this cheerful couple would want to vacation in the worst part of Los Angeles, but he doesn't know they're visitors from outer space, and their idea of fun is murdering and eating humanity's worst.
Why it matches: Similar story and style · both science fiction
Like Criteria One and something else?
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Frequently asked questions
What are the best movies like Criteria One?
The closest matches to Criteria One are Monolith (2023), 2073 (2024) and Surrogates (2009). Below are 27 more, each with the reason it matches.
What should I watch after Criteria One?
Start with Monolith (2023), the closest match to Criteria One.
What is the highest-rated movie like Criteria One?
Upgrade (2018), rated 7.5/10 by 5,378 TMDB users.
What is the newest movie like Criteria One?
Disclosure Day (2026) is the most recent release on this list.
Are there English movies like Criteria One?
Yes: Monolith (2023), 2073 (2024) and Surrogates (2009).
How are movies similar to Criteria One chosen?
First come films that Trakt’s viewers watch alongside Criteria One, then TMDB’s recommendations and films it rates as similar in story and genre. Each pick says which signal put it there.