How to watch The Boy and the Heron — is it streaming on Netflix?

Studio Ghibli claimed Oscars glory with its latest effort, so here’s how to watch The Boy and the Heron, including whether it’s available to stream on Netflix.

At some point in your life, you will have undoubtedly stumbled across an incredible Studio Ghibli movie, and it was probably spearheaded by Hayao Miyazaki. Last year, he seemed to cap off his retirement with his new movie, The Boy and the Heron (but he’s already returned to work).

The animated movie is just as weird and wonderful as you’d expect from Miyazaki. If you haven’t seen it yet, you need to change that, quickly.

So, here’s how to watch The Boy and the Heron, whether that be on Netflix or another streaming service.

Is The Boy and the Heron streaming?

The Boy and the Heron will be available to stream on Max in June 2024.

Before its arrival, we’ve also broken down how Max stacks against other streaming platforms.

Hayao Miyazaki and Studio Ghibli tend to keep a pretty tight leash on whether their films can be watched digitally, so the announcement that Max retained the rights is a huge deal. However, no exact date has been given yet.

Will The Boy and the Heron ever come to Netflix?

Yes, The Boy and the Heron will arrive on Netflix eventually, but not in the U.S. or Japan.

According to Netflix, Goodfellas, Netflix, and GKIDS have gained streaming rights to Studio Ghibli’s catalog. It includes the Oscar-winning movie, alongside the continued streaming of some of the best anime, like as Spirited Away, Princess Mononoke, Arrietty, Kiki’s Delivery Service, My Neighbor Totoro and The Tale of The Princess Kaguya.

An official release date will be revealed later this year. But there’s a catch. The Boy and Heron will be available on Netflix excluding the U.S. and Japan. This is due to Max having current streaming rights and Japan being the movie’s home market.

Is The Boy and the Heron worth watching?

The Boy and the Heron is not the best Miyazaki movie, but it’s still pretty good and definitely worth a watch.

In our review, we wrote: “If Hayao Miyazaki had the film equivalent of a Greatest Hits album, it would be The Boy and the Heron. Rather than being enjoyable for what it is, the movie’s merit rides almost solely on its moments of parodying Studio Ghibli work that came before it. Now that Miyazaki looks set to continue his lifetime passion of filmmaking, the ode doesn’t quite hit the moments of closure it would have if viewers knew this was the final hurrah.”

The movie also holds a 97% rating on Rotten Tomatoes, which is one of the highest scores given to a Ghibli movie to date.

You can also find out what other new movies you should stream this month, and discover the best movies of 2024 so far. For more anime, here are the best upcoming anime this year, and all the best anime on Netflix.