Tier List
Ice Age Movies Tier List: All 6 Films Ranked (2026)
The best Ice Age movie is the 2002 original, and the weakest is Ice Age: Collision Course (2016). Here are all 6 released Ice Age movies ranked from S-tier to D-tier, with the box office for every theatrical film and what to watch before Ice Age: Boiling Point opens in US theaters on February 5, 2027.
The Complete Ice Age Tier List
Ice Age is the animated franchise Blue Sky Studios started in 2002, following Manny the mammoth, Sid the sloth and Diego the saber-tooth tiger through the end of the last ice age. Five films reached theaters between 2002 and 2016, and a sixth premiered on Disney+ in 2022. Think Continental Drift deserves better than B? Settle it yourself in minutes with Shortlist.
Each film below also says where to watch it in the US, checked October 7, 2026 (JustWatch). Rights move, so those lines disappear rather than guess once that check is over three weeks old.
Ice Age
(2002)A mammoth, a sloth and a saber-tooth tiger walk a human baby home, and that is the whole plot. It is the only film in the series that trusts one simple story, and the quiet moments (Manny at the cave paintings) land harder than any set piece that came after. Scrat's acorn opening became the franchise's signature for good reason.
Streaming on Netflix and Disney+
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Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs
(2009)The herd drops into a hidden world of dinosaurs under the ice, and Simon Pegg's one-eyed weasel Buck steals the film. The most inventive sequel by a distance, and the biggest hit the franchise ever had. It is also the direct ancestor of Boiling Point's lost-world setting.
Streaming on Netflix, Disney+ and Hulu
Ice Age: The Meltdown
(2006)The ice is melting and the valley is about to flood. The Meltdown adds Ellie, a mammoth who thinks she is a possum, and gives Manny a real arc about not being the last of his kind. Looser than the original but warm and genuinely funny.
Streaming on Netflix, Disney+ and Hulu
Ice Age: Continental Drift
(2012)Pirates on an iceberg, Peter Dinklage as an ape captain, and Manny's teenage daughter Peaches pulling away from an overprotective dad. It is busy and formulaic, but the pirate crew gives it energy, and it very nearly matched Dawn of the Dinosaurs at the box office.
Streaming on Netflix and Disney+
The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild
(2022)A Disney+ spin-off that sends Crash and Eddie back to the dinosaur world with Buck. It plays younger than the theatrical films and most of the main voice cast did not return, but Simon Pegg did, and Buck carries it.
Streaming on Disney+
Ice Age: Collision Course
(2016)Scrat accidentally sends an asteroid at Earth and the herd has to stop it. The most expensive Ice Age film and the least loved: too many characters, too little story, and the lowest box office return the series ever posted. It is also the film Boiling Point follows directly.
Streaming on Netflix, Disney+ and Hulu
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Open your Ice Age tier sheetIce Age: Boiling Point Release Date, and What to Watch Before It
Ice Age: Boiling Point opens in US theaters on February 5, 2027, the first theatrical Ice Age film in more than 10 years. 20th Century Studios first dated it December 18, 2026, then moved it 49 days later, off the weekend Avengers: Doomsday and Dune: Part Three open.
| Date | What happened |
|---|---|
| July 22, 2016 | Ice Age: Collision Course, the last Ice Age film in theaters, opens in the US |
| January 28, 2022 | The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild premieres on Disney+ |
| December 18, 2026 | Ice Age: Boiling Point's original release date |
| February 5, 2027 | Ice Age: Boiling Point opens in US theaters |
US release dates from TMDB (theatrical, or digital for Buck Wild), read September 25, 2026. The date change was reported by The Hollywood Reporter.
What to watch first: Ice Age: Collision Course, and that is it. Ice Age: Boiling Point is the sequel to the 2016 film, so a 95-minute rewatch covers where the herd was left. If you have a full weekend, the whole series is 8h 51m. The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild is optional. It is a spin-off, but it is directed by John Donkin, who also directs Ice Age: Boiling Point, and the new film's lost world of lava and dinosaurs is the same territory Buck lives in.
The returning voices, per TMDB's cast list: Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary, Queen Latifah, Simon Pegg. That is the core theatrical cast, which Buck Wild mostly did without.
Where will it rank? Not until it opens: this list only ranks films people can actually watch. The bar is clear, though. The last theatrical entry sits at the bottom in D-tier, so matching Dawn of the Dinosaurs in A-tier would make Boiling Point the franchise's best sequel in 18 years.
Every Ice Age Movie by Box Office, Budget and Return
The 5 theatrical Ice Age films took $3.217B worldwide on $429.0M of production budget, a return of 7.50 times cost. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs is both the biggest hit at $886.7M and the best return at 9.85 times its budget.
| Film | Worldwide | Budget | Return | Tier | TMDB |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Dawn of the Dinosaurs2009 | $886.7M | $90.0M | 9.85x | A | 6.8 |
| Continental Drift2012 | $877.2M | $95.0M | 9.23x | B | 6.4 |
| The Meltdown2006 | $661.0M | $80.0M | 8.26x | A | 6.7 |
| Collision Course2016 | $408.6M | $105.0M | 3.89x | D | 6.1 |
| Ice Age2002 | $383.3M | $59.0M | 6.50x | S | 7.4 |
Worldwide grosses, production budgets, runtimes and user scores read from the TMDB API on 2026-09-25, by film id. Return is worldwide gross divided by production budget and counts no marketing spend, so treat roughly 2.5x as the break-even line. The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild premiered on Disney+ and has no box office, so it is left out of the totals.
The most expensive Ice Age film earned the least back. Ice Age: Collision Course cost $105.0M, the most of any entry, and returned 3.89 times that, the franchise low by a wide margin. The four films before it all returned more than 6 times their budgets. That drop is the context for the long gap before Ice Age: Boiling Point.
How Long Does It Take to Watch Every Ice Age Movie?
All 6 Ice Age movies run 8h 51m back to back, or 531 minutes. The 5 theatrical films alone run 7h 29m. No entry is longer than 95 minutes (Collision Course), which makes this one of the easiest complete franchise rewatches there is: one long Saturday with the kids.
How to Build Your Own Ice Age Tier List
The card above ranks all six from your taps alone, one head-to-head pick at a time, no scoring. Most people put the original on top. Where The Meltdown and Dawn of the Dinosaurs land is where the arguments start.
The app is for everything after that. Shortlist runs the same head-to-head across whatever you watch, keeps each list current as you rewatch, and gives every ranking a share link.
Read more about the comparison-based approach in our movie tier list guide, or see how Ice Age stacks up against the studio that shaped modern animation in our Pixar movies ranked list.
Two different things get scored around this page. The S to D tiers above are editorial, and S means a film that held up rather than one that reviewed well on opening weekend. The score you see in the app is a different number: it is built from the head-to-head comparisons you make, scaled to 0 to 10, not from critic averages. How Shortlist scores work sets out the whole method.
This website uses TMDB and the TMDB APIs but is not endorsed, certified, or otherwise approved by TMDB.
What Order Should You Watch the Ice Age Movies In?
Watch in release order, which is also story order: Ice Age (2002), The Meltdown (2006), Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009), Continental Drift (2012), Collision Course (2016), then The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild (2022) if you want the spin-off. Each theatrical film follows the herd forward from the last.
Ice Age Tier List FAQ
What is the best Ice Age movie?
The original Ice Age (2002), directed by Chris Wedge, is the best Ice Age movie. It is the only one built on a single simple story: Manny, Sid and Diego walking a lost human baby home. It also holds the franchise's highest TMDB user score, 7.4 from more than 14,000 votes.
How many Ice Age movies are there?
There are 6 released Ice Age movies: five theatrical films from Ice Age (2002) to Ice Age: Collision Course (2016), plus The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild (2022), which premiered on Disney+. A seventh, Ice Age: Boiling Point, opens in US theaters on February 5, 2027.
What order should you watch the Ice Age movies in?
Watch the Ice Age movies in release order, which is also story order: Ice Age (2002), Ice Age: The Meltdown (2006), Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009), Ice Age: Continental Drift (2012), Ice Age: Collision Course (2016) and The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild (2022).
When does Ice Age: Boiling Point come out?
Ice Age: Boiling Point opens in US theaters on February 5, 2027, from 20th Century Studios. It was first dated December 18, 2026 and moved off the weekend Avengers: Doomsday and Dune: Part Three open. It is the first theatrical Ice Age film in more than 10 years.
Do you need to watch Buck Wild before Ice Age: Boiling Point?
No. Ice Age: Boiling Point is the sequel to Ice Age: Collision Course (2016), so that is the one film to watch first. The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild (2022) is a Disney+ spin-off about Buck, Crash and Eddie, though it shares a director with the new film: John Donkin.
How much money did the Ice Age movies make?
The five theatrical Ice Age films took $3.217B worldwide on $429.0M of production budget, a return of 7.50 times cost. Ice Age: Dawn of the Dinosaurs (2009) is both the highest grosser at $886.7M and the best return at 9.85 times its budget. The Ice Age Adventures of Buck Wild went straight to Disney+ and has no box office.
How long does it take to watch all the Ice Age movies?
All six Ice Age movies run 8h 51m back to back, or 531 minutes. The five theatrical films alone run 7h 29m, and no entry is longer than 95 minutes.
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