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Until we hear otherwise, it's safe to assume that Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning is the last installment in the action franchise and the swansong for Tom Cruise's IMF agent Ethan Hunt. With the series at an end, then, there's never been a better time to watch the Mission: Impossible movies in order.
Of course, the Mission: Impossible series was released in chronological order, so it's not a particularly difficult franchise to get to grips with compared to, say, the Marvel timeline. The movies aren't numbered, though, so it's not always the easiest task to know which film comes next.
How to watch the Mission: Impossible movies in release order
Below is a bullet point list of all the Mission: Impossible movies in release order:
- Mission: Impossible (1996)
- Mission: Impossible 2 (2000)
- Mission: Impossible III (2006)
- Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol (2011)
- Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation (2015)
- Mission: Impossible – Fallout (2018)
- Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning (2023)
- Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning (2025)
How to watch the Mission: Impossible movies in chronological order
Below are detailed descriptions of all the Mission: Impossible movies in chronological order.
We've made sure to break down how each film sets up the Mission: Impossible timeline, so you have as much information as possible before going into your next watch-through.
1. Mission: Impossible
Year: 1996
Director: Brian De Palma
Back in the 1990s, Tom Cruise had a much more varied filmography than he does these days, but action has always been a part of his oeuvre. That's how he came to be the star of a kinetic reboot of a TV show from the 1960s, packed to the brim with shadowy spycraft and more plot than exists in any of the Christopher McQuarrie films put together.
This movie introduces us to Ethan Hunt as a competent agent in the Impossible Missions Force who finds himself accused of being the mole responsible for attempting to leak a valuable list of undercover operatives. He must race against time to expose the true mole and clear his name. Director Brian De Palma – of Scarface and Carrie fame – certainly knows his way around an action scene and, despite not being as elaborate and splashy as what would come later, the sequence in which Hunt infiltrates the CIA headquarters is as tense and thrilling as anything the franchise has ever produced.
2. Mission: Impossible 2
Year: 2000
Director: John Woo
John Woo thought he was making a James Bond movie. That's the problem. Mission: Impossible 2 teams up Ethan and Thandiwe Newton's thief to take on rogue IMF agent Dougray Scott, who wants to use a biological weapon to kickstart a global pandemic. Every beat of the story structure is Bond, right up until the romance of the ending. And, to be fair, it probably felt like quite a good time to be trying to outdo Bond, given the limping final years of the Pierce Brosnan era.
Mission: Impossible 2 is certainly a better James Bond movie than Die Another Day – and it doesn't have a dire Madonna theme tune either. There's a lot of silly fun to be had in Mission: Impossible 2, but it's a visually messy and narratively strange film that feels alien to the energy and identity that this franchise would grow to have in later years.
Read our Mission: Impossible 2 review
3. Mission: Impossible III
Year: 2006
Director: JJ Abrams
It's strange to think that David Fincher was once in line to direct the third Mission: Impossible movie. In the end, though, the early development period was troubled, and Fincher fell by the wayside. In the end, it was JJ Abrams who stepped into the director's chair, and it took a sizable pay cut from Tom Cruise to rescue the project from sliding into development hell. Really, it's just as well Cruise did take the hit, because Mission: Impossible III stands as a very strong installment in the series.
Much of the credit has to go to the almighty Philip Seymour Hoffman, who delivers a remarkable performance as the villain Owen Davian. He's an arms dealer on the hunt for a biological weapon called the Rabbit's Foot. Hoffman is utterly chilling as Davian, and the movie has added stakes thanks to the addition of Michelle Monaghan as Hunt’s fiancée, who knows nothing about the IMF. This gives the franchise a more personal and character-focused side than had been present in the previous films. The stage was set for the series to take its next leap.
Read our Mission: Impossible 3 review
4. Mission: Impossible – Ghost Protocol
Year: 2011
Director: Brad Bird
This is arguably where the Mission: Impossible franchise as we know it today really kicked into high gear. Ghost Protocol is the movie in which Tom Cruise scaled the outside of the Burj Khalifa – the world's tallest building – and cemented himself as the most fearless action man in all of Hollywood. The plot once again sees Ethan battling outside the system, with the IMF officially shut down by the US government after taking the blame for a bombing at the Kremlin.
But that small wrinkle doesn't stop Ethan from pursuing a dangerous terrorist whose goal is to initiate nuclear war between the USA and Russia. Ghost Protocol is one of the best action movies in the franchise, helped by Pixar director Brad Bird bringing some much-needed levity to the table. Everyone in the cast was hitting their stride at just the right time, and the plot actually made more sense than usual. And did we mention that Tom Cruise climbed the tallest building in the world? Just wanted to make sure.
Read our Mission: Impossible - Ghost Protocol review
5. Mission: Impossible – Rogue Nation
Year: 2015
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
During the production of Ghost Protocol, Tom Cruise brought his Valkyrie screenwriter Christopher McQuarrie on to the set to help with rewrites. By the time that the next Mission movie came along, Cruise and McQuarrie had become firm friends and frequent collaborators, making McQ – as he likes to be called – the logical choice to take up the reins of the IMF. He hasn’t let them go ever since. Further to the events of the last movie, the CIA gets control of the IMF – though Ethan continues to work on his own.
He's on the trail of a shadowy organization called The Syndicate, which is made up of rogue agents from various intelligence agencies under the guidance of whispering madman Solomon Lane – played by Sean Harris. This doesn't feel quite as much of a step forward as Ghost Protocol, but it was certainly a great debut effort for McQuarrie, who would go on to become the first director to helm multiple Mission: Impossible adventures. Rogue Nation also introduces the mercurial MI6 agent Ilsa Faust, played brilliantly by Rebecca Ferguson.
Read our Mission: Impossible - Rogue Nation review
6. Mission: Impossible – Fallout
Year: 2018
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
Best known as "the one where Henry Cavill reloads his arms", this is – until The Final Reckoning at least – arguably the definitive movie of the McQuarrie era. It's a big, muscular blockbuster that brings back a lot of characters from the history of the franchise, while again pitting Ethan against the system, as he often is in the best movies of this series.
Fallout delivers truly jaw-dropping action sequences and provides one of the most memorable Mission villains in Cavill's CIA operative Walker. The final act of the film is as thrilling as Mission has ever been, culminating in a cliff face confrontation shot in the beautiful environs of New Zealand. Paramount shelled out a lot of cash to make Fallout, not least because Cruise smashed up his ankle during a stunt early in production. But they were rewarded with the highest-grossing film in the history of the franchise, amassing nearly $800m at the global box office.
Read our Mission: Impossible - Fallout review
7. Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning
Year: 2023
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
For a long time, all we knew about Mission: Impossible – Dead Reckoning was that it was going to feature Tom Cruise soaring off a cliff on the back of a motorbike. Billed as "the biggest stunt in cinema history", this incredible bit of death-defying Cruise chaos was more than enough to get long-time fans of the franchise excited for this installment, delayed and retooled as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. The movie follows Ethan and his IMF pals as they try to prevent an incredibly powerful AI known as The Entity from falling into the hands of Gabriel – a villain with ties to Ethan's past.
Naturally, though, the actual machinations of the plot are small fry in comparison to the stunts, whether it's that bike jump or the finale set in the tumbling carriages of a runaway train. Dead Reckoning struggled a little at the box office in a summer dominated by Barbenheimer, sparking a decision by Paramount to rebrand the subsequent film as a standalone sequel rather than a second part of the Dead Reckoning story. But that's not to say that Dead Reckoning is anything other than another winner of an action movie.
Read our Mission: Impossible - Dead Reckoning Part One review
8. Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning
Year: 2025
Director: Christopher McQuarrie
That brings us right through to today and the concluding part of the series – or so we've been led to believe. Though anybody who's a fan of horror movies and has lived through the likes of The Final Destination, and Jason Goes to Hell: The Final Friday – none of which marked the end of their franchises – will know that definitive titling is not necessarily a guarantee of truth. Despite the title departing from the Dead Reckoning name, the narrative does follow on from where we were before.
Around three months after the events of Dead Reckoning, The Entity is still in play, and Gabriel still looms, though we are, of course, more interested in watching Cruise dangle from the side of a plane in motion. These movies are smart enough to understand that nobody is particularly following the story. It's not clear whether this will actually mark Cruise's farewell to the character of Ethan Hunt, but it's certainly being sold as something like IMF: Endgame. After the best part of 30 years, could it be time for Cruise to hang up his boots? If we know him at all, he'll be hanging them upside down and on fire. We'd never have him any other way.
Read our Mission: Impossible – The Final Reckoning review
Looking for more how to watch guides? Check out our pages on how to watch all the Marvel movies in order and how to watch James Bond in order.
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