As “Stranger Things” fans speculate on runtimes for the Netflix series’ upcoming fifth and final installment, creator Ross Duffer set the record straight by sharing the actual runtimes for Season 5’s first four episodes.
Duffer, who created “Stranger Things” alongside his brother, Matt, posted the “actual runtimes” in a Monday Instagram post by sharing a video of the episodes and their length as they appear on his Netflix screeners.
The runtimes are as follows:
- S. 5 E.1: “The Crawl” — 1 hour, 8 minutes
- S. 5 E.2: “The Vanishing of [Redacted]” — 54 minutes
- S. 5 E.3: “The Turnbow Trap” — 1 hour, 6 minutes
- S. 5 E.4: “Sorcerer” — 1 hour, 23 minutes
Duffer set the record straight on the actual runtimes after fans had been speculating that Season 5 would consist of much longer episodes, with some viewers guessing that episodes would be closer to 2 hours.
Fans were right that episodes would be longer than past seasons, which previously stuck to under an hour per episode until “Stranger Things 4,” but not by too much, and some episodes of “Stranger Things 4” are even longer than the episodes in “Stranger Things 5” Volume 1. That said, the runtimes of the additional installments, including the grand series finale, which will debut on its own on New Year’s Eve, are not yet known.
Fans claiming longer runtimes might have glommed onto Duffer’s comments about Season 5 being the “biggest and most ambitious season yet” and his comparison to “eight blockbuster movies” in one season that he made at the 2025 Next on Netflix event in January.
“Stranger Things” Season 5 will be split into three parts, with Volume 1, which consists of four episodes, debuting the day before Thanksgiving on Wednesday, Nov. 26, while Volume 2, which consists of three episodes, debuts on Christmas, while the Finale releases on New Year’s Eve. All episodes will drop at 5 p.m. PT on their respective days.
