Wizarding Worldz
You can choose from two lists. chronological in terms of the Marvel Superhero Movies order of events and release date.
There are currently 28 and counting Marvel Cinematic Universe movies. They all take place in the same universe and have characters, events, and settings that link them together.
So it’s understandable if you’re not sure how they all fit together and in what order to watch them. Marvel’s The Avengers, which came out in 2012, was a first for the company. It brought together heroes from different movies (Robert Downey Jr.’s Iron Man, Chris Evans’ Captain America, and Chris Hemsworth’s Thor) and then split them up into their own sequels.
This way of telling stories had been done in comics, but telling a serialized story over many, many films with different tones and characters was brand new, and it continues to be a gold mine of interesting stories and characters.
But as the number of movies in the MCU has grown, so has its complexity. Some movies take place on other planets, but they happen at the same time as things on Earth. And some movies take place a long time ago.
If you want to know how to watch Marvel movies in the right order, we can help. Here are two ways to look at the Marvel movies: in order of when they came out in theaters or in order of when the events in the movies happened.
Both are highly recommended and the best way to watch this series is if you want to watch it all in one sitting. Then, we’ll tell you how to watch the Marvel Disney Plus shows in the right order.
The order of these lists is also based a lot on our own detailed MCU timeline, which shows when every event in the Marvel Cinematic Universe takes place.
Marvel Superhero Movies Order of Release
Here is a list of all the Marvel Cinematic Universe movies in the order they came out. They are separated into “phases,” which is what Marvel Studios calls smaller story arcs within the larger MCU story arc.
Phase One
- Iron Man – May 2, 2008
- The Amazing Hulk: June 13, 2008
- Iron Man 2 – May 7, 2010
- Thor – 6 mai 2011
- Captain America: The First Avenger came out on July 22, 2011.
- The Avengers from Marvel – May 4, 2012
Phase Two
- Iron Man 3 – May 3, 2013
- Thor: The Dark World comes out on November 8, 2013.
- Captain America: The Winter Soldier came out on April 4, 2014.
- Guardians of the Galaxy: The First of August, 2014
- Age of Ultron comes out on May 1, 2015.
- Ant-Man came out on July 17, 2015.
Phase Three
- Captain America: Civil War came out on May 6, 2016.
- Doctor Strange: The 4th of November, 2016
- The movie Guardians of the Galaxy, Vol. 2 – May 5, 2017
- Spider-Man: Homecoming comes out on July 7, 2017.
- Thor: Ragnarok comes out on November 3, 2017.
- Black Panther came out on Feb. 16, 2018.
- April 27, 2018: Avengers: Infinity War
- Ant-Man and the Wasp comes out on July 6, 2018.
- Captain Marvel comes out on March 8, 2019
- Avengers: Endgame – April 26, 2019
- Far from Home comes out on July 2, 2019.
Phase Four
- Black Widow is on July 9, 2021.
- Shang-Chi and the Legend of the Ten Rings will come out on September 3, 2021.
- Eternals – November 5, 2021
- Spider-Man: No Way Home comes out on December 17, 2021.
- Doctor Strange and the Many Worlds of Madness comes out on May 6, 2022.
- Thor: Love and Thunder come out on July 8, 2022.
- Wakanda Forever: Black Panther – November 11, 2022
- Quantum Mania comes out on February 17, 2023.
- The Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 3 – May 5, 2023
- The Marvels, or Captain Marvel 2, will come out on July 28, 2023.
- Fantastic Four – To Be Announced
- Phase Four and later
- Blade – TBA
- Untitled Deadpool Movie – To Be Announced
- Untitled Captain America Sequel – To Be Announced
- Untitled Shang-Chi Sequel—To Be Announced
- Untitled Mutant Film – To Be Announced
Marvel Superhero Movies Order of when things happen
Hayley Atwell in “Captain America: The First Avenger.” Image from Marvel Studios.
1. Captain America: The First Avenger
In terms of time, Captain America: The First Avenger is the MCU movie that takes place the farthest back in time. The story of how Steve Rogers came starts in 1940 when Steve (played by Chris Evans) and Bucky Barnes (played by Sebastian Stan) join the army. The story ends in 1945 when Steve’s plane crashes and he is frozen for the next 50 years.
2. Captain Marvel: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
Next is Captain Marvel, which is one of the newest Marvel movies, but its story takes place before the main MCU timeline. The pilot played by Brie Larson crashes her plane in 1989. After that, she is trained as a Kree and then goes back to Earth in 1995, which is when most of Captain Marvel takes place.
3. Iron Man: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
The first Marvel movie to come out came third in terms of time, and, believe it or not, Marvel’s own timeline says that it takes place in 2010, not 2008 when it came out.
4. The Incredible Hulk
The events of the Hulk movie with Edward Norton happen soon after the events of the Iron Man movie.
5. Iron Man 2
The second Iron Man movie takes place in 2011.
6. Thor: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
Thor also takes place in 2011, around the same time as Iron Man 2, but there are flashbacks to events that happened hundreds of years ago.
7. The Avengers: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
The meeting finally takes place in 2012.
8. Iron Man 3: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
The underrated Iron Man 3 takes place in 2012 and is mostly about Tony Stark’s PTSD after what happened in The Avengers.
9. Thor: The Dark World
The sequel, which isn’t very good, takes place in 2013.
10. The Winter Soldier: Captain America
The Big Fall of S.H.I.E.L.D. takes place in 2014, a few years after S.H.I.E.L.D. helped form The Avengers.
11. Guardians of the Galaxy
Guardians of the Galaxy takes place around the same time as The Winter Soldier, in 2014.
12. Guardians of the Galaxy Vol. 2: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
The second Guardians movie takes place a few months after the first movie.
13. Avengers: Age of Ultron
The second Avengers movie takes place in 2015 after S.H.I.E.L.D. has been broken up.
14. Ant-Man: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
In 2015, Scott Lang is busy becoming Ant-Man while the Avengers are busy fighting Ultron.
15. Captain America: Civil War
The sequel to Captain America, which is also sort of an Avengers movie, takes place in 2016. It adds more characters to the mix to set up Infinity War and Endgame. But it also has flashbacks that happen between The First Avenger and Iron Man and shows how Tony Stark’s parents died.
16. Black Widow: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
In the Black Widow movie, Natasha Romanoff, played by Scarlett Johansson, is on the run right after the events of Captain America: Civil War. It’s over before Avengers: Infinity War starts.
17. Spider-Man: Homecoming
After the events of Captain America: Civil War, the first MCU Spider-Man movie takes place in the fall, with Tom Holland’s Peter Parker struggling to become his own hero.
18. The Black Panther
2016 is a busy year in the MCU. Black Panther also takes place in Wakanda in 2016.
19. Doctor Strange: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
Doctor Strange fills in the time between 2016 and 2017, since it takes Stephen Strange a while to become a superhero.
20. Thor: Ragnarok
Thor: Ragnarok is set in 2017, not long after what happened in Doctor Strange. Thor goes to see Doctor Strange on Earth to try to find his father.
21. Ant-Man and the Wasp: Marvel Superhero Movies Order
Even though Ant-Man and the Wasp came out after Avengers: Infinity War, it takes place in 2018, right before Thanos comes to Earth. The movie ends with the famous Thanos Snap. Even though there are scenes from the late 1980s with Hank Pym (Michael Douglas) and Janet Van Dyne (Michelle Pfeiffer).
22. Avengers: Infinity War
In 2018, Avengers: Infinity War takes place over a very short amount of time, only 24–48 hours.
23. Avengers: Endgame
The second part of the Infinity Gauntlet story starts soon after Thanos snaps his fingers in 2018. After Thor cuts Thanos’ head off, the movie flashes forward and is mostly set in 2023, but the characters also go back in time to 1970, 2012, 2013, and 2014 to see what happened there.
24. Spider-Man: Far from Home
The events of Avengers: Endgame happen right before the events of Spider-Man: Far from Home.
25. Love and Thunder: Thor
Even though it came out after Multiverse of Madness, the fourth Thor book seems to take place in 2024. We can figure this out by looking at when Jane and Thor broke up, which was probably in late 2015 or early 2016 before Thor left Earth.
In Love and Thunder, Thor corrects Jane when she says that they haven’t been together for 8 years, 7 months, and 6 days. Jane thinks it’s only been 3 or 4 years, but since she vanished after the blip, that time loss makes sense. We won’t know for sure where this movie belongs until Love and Thunder come out on Disney+.