Netflix’s Squid Game rakes in 111M views, takes the crown from Bridgerton

Make way for Netflix’s biggest series with a whopping 111 million views: Hwang Dong Hyuk’s survival K-drama, Squid Game. The streaming behemoth announced on October 13, that the show has been watched in more than a hundred million households in just a month since its release.

The K-drama’s unexpected global success makes this achievement anything but surprising. It overtook the British show Bridgerton, which sat on the No.1 spot of Netflix's most-watched show rankings for quite a while. Netflix’s co-CEO, Ted Sarandos, had stated back in September that if the Squid Game craze were to continue, it would easily become the streaming platform’s biggest show.

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Squid Game officially becomes Netflix’s biggest show, with 111 million users

The dystopian survival drama Squid Game was released on September 17 and became an international phenomenon in just a couple of days of its release. The nine-episode show ranked No. 1 in more than 90 countries worldwide, becoming the first non-English show to top the U.S chart.

As per The Korean Herald, Kim Min-young, vice president of content in Asia Pacific excluding India, said,

“Since Netflix launched its Korean service in 2015, our goal was to display quality Korean-made content to those who love Korean shows across the world. Squid Game' helped our dream come true.”

She even revealed that she and her team knew some aspects of Squid Game would be popular, but not to this extent.

The British period romance drama Bridgerton, with its massive popularity, held 82 million accounts captivated. It topped Lupin, The Witcher, S*x/Life and even Stranger Things season 3. That is, until Squid Game was released.

The craze for it has taken over the world. Whether it be making Dalgona candy a TikTok trend or sporting Squid Game character costumes for Halloween - there’s not a single day the world does not talk about the survival drama. Fans even sold out simple white slip-on Vans.

It proved a success for the actors who took part in it too. The show’s incredible reception led lead veteran actors Lee Jung Jae and Park Hae Soo to open personal Instagram accounts. It even made Jung Ho Yeon, who made her acting debut in the show, become the most followed Korean actress on Instagram.

Its popularity has even led Netflix to create Squid Game inspired Profile Icons. It has all the players along with the umbrella-embossed Dalgona candy, the Mugunghwa flower girl Young Hee, Front Man and masked workers.

Meanwhile, this unexpected outpouring of love and support has director Hwang Dong Hyuk opening up about his struggles to create Squid Game.