You don't need to be the type of person who goes to Disneyland for every vacation to appreciate how many great movies Walt Disney Animated Studios has made. Disney was responsible for the first feature-length animated movie in America with Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs way back in 1937, and in the decades since then the House of Mouse has made dozens of the most iconic and beloved animated movies of all time.
These are the 32 best theatrically released animated movies that Disney ever made. You'll find films from the studio's earliest days as a pioneer of animation as a medium, successes from the fallow period in the '70s and '80s, triumphs from the Disney Renaissance, and more recent movies that show how computer-animated movies can have the same Disney magic as the hand-drawn classics.
Please note that this list only features movies produced by Walt Disney Animation Studios, which means that Pixar's films are not eligible. Although Pixar is owned by Disney, and Disney distributed Pixar's movies before being acquired outright, it is a distinctly different studio.
32. Treasure Planet
Year: 2002
Directors: John Musker, Ron Clements
This sci-fi adaptation of Robert Louis Stevenson's classic pirate novel Treasure Island has a rough reputation, as the movie was so expensive and was such a bomb at the box office that it basically killed Disney's interest in making any traditionally animated films. There wouldn't be another traditionally animated Disney movie until The Princess and the Frog in 2009, and that would be an exception, not the rule. It's a shame, especially because it shouldn't be held against Treasure Planet, a swashbuckling, spacefaring adventure.
31. Alice in Wonderland
Year: 1951
Directors: Ben Sharpsteen, Clyde Geronimi, Wilfred Jackson, and Hamilton Luske
One of Disney's most visually inventive and trippiest films has a fittingly imaginative source material, Lewis Carroll's 1865 novel Alice's Adventures in Wonderland. Disney's Alice is a quirky, unique film, one that tells the story of the young girl's journey through the rabbit hole and across this absurd world with plenty of unusual flair and beauty. It's a somewhat meandering movie, shaggier than some of Disney's other films from the era, but that distinctive, uncanny vibe enhances the experience.
30. Wreck-It Ralph
Year: 2012
Director: Rich Moore
Disney's live-action side may have tackled video games first with the '80s cult classic Tron, but it's the 2012 animated film Wreck-It Ralph that really succeeded. John C. Reilly stars as Ralph, the villain in an arcade game who doesn't want to be a bad guy, so he ditches his game and heads to other digital pastures in an attempt to become a hero. Full of Easter eggs and nice bits of gamer humor (but not so much that it overshadows the earnestness of the plot), Wreck-It Ralph is a level-up for movies about video games.
29. Tangled
Year: 2010
Directors: Nathan Greno and Byron Howard
It's kind of surprising that it took Disney basically three-quarters of a century to get around to adapting the classic fairy tale Rapunzel into a movie, though they admittedly did a great job when they made Tangled in 2010. Starring Mandy Moore as the long-haired princess trapped in a tower and Zachary Levi as the rogue who helps her escape and finally experience the world, Tangled is a thoroughly charming and modern take on a fairy tale. Disney's computer animation would only get better in the years that followed, but thankfully, Tangled looks pretty good, too.
28. Lady and the Tramp
Year: 1955
Directors: Hamilton Luske, Clyde Geronimi, and Wilfred Jackson
Lady and the Tramp, which was released right in the middle of the '50s, boasts some of the most classically feeling "Disney-style" animation. The art direction easily helps Lady and the Tramp be so iconic, though it also makes the movie—a sweet love story between two dogs from opposite sides of the metaphorical tracks—feel a little staid at times. It's not Disney's most exciting or ambitious film, but it's undeniable. You can't eat spaghetti and not think of Lady and the Tramp on some level. That's a legacy!
27. The Great Mouse Detective
Year: 1986
Directors: John Musker, Ron Clements, Dave Michener, and Burny Mattinson
Sherlock Holmes gets the Disney treatment in The Great Mouse Detective, which riffs on the iconic sleuth by presenting a tiny rodent counterpart faced with a big mystery. It's a thrill and a delight to watch Basil (Barrie Ingham) try to crack the case and stop Professor Ratigan, a great villain voiced by the one and only Vincent Price, from unleashing his diabolical plan on the mice of London. Though released a few years before the official start of the Disney Renaissance, The Great Mouse Detective definitely represents the start of an upswing for the studio after a rough creative patch.
26. Atlantis: The Lost Empire
Year: 2001
Directors: Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise
Before Disney owned Star Wars and Marvel, the studio made a concerted effort to make more movies "for boys," since they figured they had the little girl market locked up with the princess films. One such effort was Atlantis: The Lost Empire, a steampunk-tinted underwater adventure. Atlantis isn't perfect; you can tell that it's going for a big epic that's perhaps more ambitious in scope than it can ultimately pull off. Still, it's a very cool film and one that's quite different from most everything else Disney has made.
25. Frozen
Year: 2013
Directors: Chris Buck and Jennifer Lee
The hold that Frozen has over little girls who see it cannot be overstated, and it's easy to see why: It's about two princesses (well, one, since Elsa is a queen while Anna is a princess) with spunk, beautiful gowns, and a complex sisterly relationship. There is also a talking snowman. That appeal, combined with a pretty neat subversion of "love at true sight" and an all-time Disney song in "Let It Go," makes up for some of the awkwardness of Frozen's plot.
24. The Princess and the Frog
Year: 2009
Directors: John Musker and Ron Clements
Disney's first Black princess, Tiana (Anika Noni Rose), leads this riff on the Frog Prince fairy tale, one that makes plenty of changes to the old fable, most notably changing the setting to New Orleans and having the princess turn from a human into a frog when she kisses the prince rather than the other way around. A return to traditional animation (albeit a brief one, as a Winnie the Pooh movie two years later would be the last traditionally animated movie Disney would make for well over a decade), The Princess and the Frog is a jazzy tale of love in the bayou, and Tiana fits right in alongside all the Disney princesses who came before her.
23. The Rescuers
Year: 1977
Directors: Wolfgang Reitherman, John Lounsbery, Art Stevens
A truly bizarre film in the most charming sort of way, The Rescuers is about a shadow United Nations of mice who help kids, with a socialite mouse (Eva Gabor) and a janitor mouse (a puttering Bob Newhart) teaming up to rescue a little girl who has been kidnapped in a Louisiana swamp. This premise is a lot, and yet there's something so wonderfully scrappy and understated about the entire movie. In 1990, Disney released The Rescuers Down Under, making The Rescuers the first of their films to get a sequel. Down Under is fun, but it's a lot more polished and missing some of the odd warmth of the original.
22. The Aristocats
Year: 1970
Director: Wolfgang Reitherman
A joyful animal adventure, The Aristocats follows a housecat and her three kittens after they're kidnapped from their wealthy owner's home and left for dead because their owner's butler is mad that these pets will inherit her wealth before he does. This sets the kitties up on a quest through the French countryside, accompanied by a charismatic tomcat, as they make their way back home. It's a great time with pleasant vibes, and soon you'll understand why everybody wants to be a cat.
21. Hercules
Year: 1997
Directors: John Musker and Ron Clements
Experts of the Classics will no doubt have some quibbles with how fast and loose Disney's adaptation of the story of Hercules and his twelve labours plays with the ancient Greek myth. It's hardly a faithful retelling of the tale, as it softens a lot of aspects and reimagines others, making Hercules a more straightforward hero and turning Hades into a straightforward villain. Considering that James Woods' performance as Hades is one of the best Disney villains ever, maybe that's okay, and Hercules is a fun, exuberant romp in part because it's not too beholden to antiquity.
20. Encanto
Year: 2021
Directors: Jared Bush and Byron Howard
The movie that gave us "We Don't Talk About Bruno" is such a triumph largely because of the songs that Hamilton creator Lin-Manuel Miranda penned for it, as they're all so catchy that they paper over some of the more uneven parts of the story. Stephanie Beatriz stars as Mirabel, a teenage girl and the only member of her magical family who doesn't have a special power. Encanto is a wonderfully complex story about family and trauma, to the point where sometimes it seems like the metaphor gets away from the film a little bit. The intent is undeniable, though, as is the music.
19. Lilo & Stitch
Year: 2002
Directors: Chris Sanders, Dean DeBlois
"Ohana means family." An especially beloved Disney movie by members of the Millennial generation, Lilo & Stitch is a unique and earnest story about found family. Lilo (voiced by Daveigh Chase) is a young, lonely Hawaiian girl who lives with her older sister following their parents' deaths. Stitch (whose gibberish is voiced by co-director Chris Sanders) is an escaped alien genetic experiment from outer space who crash-lands on the islands. When Lilo adopts Stitch from a very confused dog shelter, it's the beginning of an unusual but profound bond.
18. Pinocchio
Year: 1940
Directors: Ben Sharpsteen and Hamilton Luske
Disney's second-ever movie was an adaptation of the Italian children's novel, and even though the movie is a lot less dark than Carlo Collodi's source material, it's still surprisingly grim compared to later Disney films. Following the wooden boy as he goes on a series of misadventures alongside his conscience, Jiminy Cricket, Pinocchio is strange and frequently scary while always being pretty gorgeous to watch. It's a fascinating look at Disney's early days and the infancy of animated films when the nature of children's entertainment was still being figured out.
17. The Fox and the Hound
Year: 1981
Directors: Art Stevens, Ted Berman, and Richard Rich
One of the most melancholy movies Disney ever made was 1981s The Fox and the Hound, an adaptation of the 1967 novel of the same name. Following a young fox and a little puppy as they become fast friends before growing up and realizing that their friendship isn't meant to be and they're supposed to be enemies (the hunter and the hunted), it's an agonizingly sad movie that builds towards one of the most bittersweet endings in a film, and certainly one of the biggest downers that Disney has ever pulled off. It's not necessarily a "feel good" flick, which makes it that much more special amongst the Disney canon.
16. Robin Hood
Year: 1973
Director: Wolfgang Reitherman
Perhaps Disney at the studio's most playful, this 1973 adaptation of the classic folktale of Robin Hood reimagines the emerald archer and all the rest of the Merry Men as anthropomorphic animals. (The foxy Robin was an unexpected foundational crush for a lot of viewers.) A loosey-goosey retelling of the story, Robin Hood is unbothered and charming, resulting in a delightfully laid-back adventure story with great character designs and immaculate vibes.
15. Bambi
Year: 1942
Director: David D. Hand
The death of Bambi's mother is one of the major traumatic moments in cinema history, and indeed, the shocking death is devastating. If that's all you remember from Bambi, though, you owe yourself a re-watch. It's among Disney's most gorgeous films, a hand-made recreation of a beautiful woodland, striking a perfect balance between anthropomorphism and naturalistic realism as it tells the story of Bambi's adolescence and growth as the Great Prince of the Forest.
14. The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh
Year: 1977
Directors: Wolfgang Reitherman and John Lounsbery
The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, an anthology adaptation of a few of A. A. Milne's beloved Winnie the Pooh series, so perfectly adapts the storybook quality of the originals to the screen (to the point where parts of the film are literally playing with the text of the books). This take on Pooh has become so iconic in its own right that it's hard to imagine the silly ol' bear without hearing Sterling Holloway's distinctive voice, and in many ways, Disney created the defining version of the beloved honey-loving Pooh.
13. The Emperor's New Groove
Year: 2000
Director: Mark Dindal
Originally conceived as a more traditional Disney musical about the Incan Empire titled Kingdom of the Sun, The Emperor's New Groove had a chaotic production and ended up being something entirely different. The result might be Disney's funniest movie; an irreverent comedy about a self-centered emperor (David Spade) who gets transformed into a llama and must work with a lowly peasant (John Goodman) to regain his throne—and maybe experience a little bit of personal growth along the way. Just a little.
12. Mulan
Year: 1998
Directors: Barry Cook and Tony Bancroft
An adaptation of the Chinese legend of a woman who took her father's place in the army by disguising herself as a man, Mulan is a tremendously exciting and important Disney movie that many Asian-American viewers found a special resonance with. An epic with fun songs in its first half and comic relief (like Eddie Murphy's dragon Mushu) that doesn't distract from the emotions or high stakes, Mulan is perhaps the best kid-appropriate war movie ever made, in addition to its many other great qualities.
11. The Hunchback of Notre Dame
Year: 1996
Directors: Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise
Disney's 1996 adaptation of Victor Hugo's novel is one of the most mature and complex films the animation studio has ever released, exploring some quite advanced themes like religious hypocrisy, lust, and discrimination of many sorts. The comic relief, like the talking gargoyles who crack jokes and help Quasimodo out, feels forced. For these reasons, The Hunchback of Notre Dame is not really a kid-favorite Disney movie, which on the one hand might be considered a failure considering it's a Disney movie and kids are the primary audience, but as an ambitious piece of cinema, it's stunning and worthy of adult appreciation.
10. Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs
Year: 1937
Director: David Hand
Few movies are as important to the history of cinema as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, Disney's first feature film and one of the first full-length animated films ever made—and certainly the most influential. That alone earns Snow White a spot on any list of the best Disney movies, though, of course, the movie itself is also exceptional. These many, many decades after it first came out, Snow White shows its age, but the beauty of the hand-drawn 1930s animation endures, as does an iconic take on a familiar fairy tale.
9. One Hundred and One Dalmatians
Year: 1961
Directors: Wolfgang Reitherman, Hamilton Luske, and Clyde Geronimi
First things first: One hundred and one Dalmatians is way too many dogs. Having said that, everything else about the London lifestyle that Roger and Anita—and their dogs Pongo and Perdita—enjoy is among the most enviable and charming scenes Disney has ever depicted. Cool and stylish, One Hundred and One Dalmatians is a doggone delight about some dogs who are gone and the lengths their parents will go to to rescue them from the clutches of Cruella de Vil.
8. The Little Mermaid
Year: 1989
Directors: John Musker and Ron Clements
The Little Mermaid is the movie that's responsible for the Disney Renaissance and, essentially, Disney as we know it to be today. Arriving at the end of two decades where the studio seemed unsure of what it was trying to do with its films, The Little Mermaid, in large part because of songwriter Howard Ashman, applied Broadway-style songs and pacing to Hans Christian Andersen's Danish fairy tale, an instant and tremendous recipe for success that later films like The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast would only improve on.
7. Moana
Year: 2016
Directors: John Musker and Ron Clements
Lin-Manuel Miranda had audiences considering the coconut in Disney's best film of the 2010s, a seafaring adventure following the brave title character (Auliʻi Cravalho) as far as she'd go across the Pacific, joined by Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson's confident demigod Maui. No other Disney movie of the era so perfectly blended the new computer animated style with the undeniable feel of the classic musicals of the Disney Renaissance, and Moana has more than earned its place in the top echelon of Disney masterpieces.
6. Aladdin
Year: 1992
Directors: John Musker and Ron Clements
Aladdin is another tremendously important Disney movie in the history of animation, and it's all because of the Genie. Prior to Robin Williams' casting, it was unbecoming for a big, popular movie star to step into a recording booth to do voice acting. After Aladdin, though, getting stars to voice characters became the norm. That shouldn't take away from Aladdin or Williams' performance at all, though. He's extraordinary as the Genie, an undeniable pop of lively color amidst an exciting tale of Arabian nights that features several of Disney's best songs.
5. Cinderella
Year: 1950
Directors: Wilfred Jackson, Hamilton Luske, and Clyde Geronimi
Coming out of World War II and the 1940s, Disney was in pretty rough shape as a company, having released a couple of box office failures and a string of anthology films that are hardly lasting classics. Cinderella was what saved the House of Mouse. An adaptation of the classic fairy tale, Cinderella is quite simply one of Disney's most magical movies, following the titular character as she gets her happily ever after ending with just a little help from her Fairy Godmother and a bunch of helpful mice.
4. Beauty and the Beast
Year: 1991
Directors: Gary Trousdale and Kirk Wise
If The Little Mermaid showed the way, Beauty and the Beast(along with The Lion King a few years later) perfected the Disney Renaissance's style of moviemaking. The first animated movie ever to be nominated for Best Picture at the Oscars and the only one to do so before the Academy expanded the number of Best Picture nominees from five to ten, Beauty and the Beast is an undeniable masterpiece It's also a flick that was able to overcome the inherent bias audiences tend to have against thinking of "kids cartoons" as "serious" films. On top of all that, Belle and the Beast is one of cinema's great romances, and the movie has incredible songs to go along with its stunning visuals and earnest emotion.
3. The Lion King
Year: 1994
Director: Roger Allers and Rob Minkoff
Perhaps the greatest movie of Disney's stories '90s run, The Lion King is a breathtaking epic. A loose adaptation of Hamlet set in the animal kingdom rather than the Kingdom of Denmark, The Lion King is fittingly majestic. It's a sweeping tale about growing up and fulfilling one's duty, following Simba as he's forced to flee from the pridelands when his evil uncle kills his father, Mufasa, and it culminates in the now-adult lion's glorious return. The Lion King is among Disney's most impressive and moving movies, well worth its perch near the top of the metaphorical Pride Rock of Disney rankings.
2. Sleeping Beauty
Year: 1959
Director: Clyde Geronimi
Sleeping Beauty is the most beautiful film Disney ever made—and one of the most beautiful movies ever made, period. The dazzling art style, intended to resemble a Medieval tapestry, is awe-inspiring, and that alone would make Sleeping Beauty one of Disney's best films. There's plenty more to celebrate about Sleeping Beauty than just its look, though. The movie is an incredible fairy tale adaptation, boasting one of the most iconic villains in Maleficent. And, though there are understandable complaints that the title character is passive for a lot of the movie (because she's asleep), such criticisms overlook the true protagonists of the film: The Good Fairies, a trio of the best characters in all of fantasy filmmaking.
1. Fantasia
Year: 1940
Directors: Samuel Armstrong, James Algar, Bill Roberts, Paul Satterfield, Ben Sharpsteen, David D. Hand, Hamilton Luske, Jim Handley, Ford Beebe, T. Hee, Norman Ferguson, and Wilfred Jackson
Disney's most unique film, a dialog-free anthology of gorgeously animated visually accompanying classical music, Fantasia is a true wonder. Featuring dinosaurs, Greek myth, demons from a mountain, ballet-dancing ostriches, a magical Mickey Mouse, and much more, it was a big, ambitious effort to elevate animation even in the medium's early days. Say what you will about ol' Walt's legacy and the impact that Disney as a corporation has had on culture at large, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a better example of art for art's sake than Fantasia.
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