Best TV Shows About Time Travel

Time travel stories come in many shapes and sizes, from closed loop mysteries to sprawling adventures that hop across eras. This list brings together a wide range of shows that tackle cause and effect, paradoxes, and timelines in ways that keep the rules clear while still finding new angles to explore. You will find police procedurals with temporal twists, family dramas built on ripples in history, and science fiction that leans into the mechanics of jumping through time.

Each pick includes straightforward details about what the show covers, how its time travel works inside the story, and the kind of structure you can expect. When a show first ran on broadcast or cable, the original network is noted in a natural way. When a show was built for streaming, you will see the platform mentioned so you know where it originally lived.

‘Doctor Who’ (1963–present)

This series follows the Doctor, a time traveler from the planet Gallifrey who journeys in the TARDIS with rotating companions. Stories range from historical visits to speculative futures, with fixed points in time, regeneration, and temporal paradoxes used as consistent world rules. The show launched on the BBC and continues to release new eras under different lead actors and showrunners.

Episodes are usually self contained adventures with seasonal arcs that link back to the Doctor’s past. Villains like the Daleks and the Cybermen recur across centuries, and multi part specials often revisit earlier events to show consequences from new angles.

‘Dark’ (2017–2020)

Set in the small town of Winden, this series maps four families across multiple time periods connected by a wormhole beneath a nuclear power plant. The story builds a detailed timeline where characters meet younger and older versions of themselves and where a bootstrap paradox drives key events. It premiered globally on Netflix.

The show uses a family tree that spans several cycles, and each episode reveals how small choices echo across generations. A device called the time machine and a doorway in the caves provide the main travel methods, while an alternate world adds a counterpart timeline that intersects with the original.

’12 Monkeys’ (2015–2018)

Based on the film of the same name, this series follows a traveler named James Cole who jumps back to prevent a global plague. The plot tracks a group called the Army of the Twelve Monkeys and a mysterious figure known as the Witness. It aired on Syfy in the United States.

Time travel uses a splintering process that creates stable and altered timelines, and memory changes as history shifts. The show organizes its seasons around missions that move between present day and key past events, tying clues together through repeating symbols and coded messages.

‘Quantum Leap’ (1989–1993)

Physicist Sam Beckett leaps into other people’s lives within his own lifetime to correct mistakes and set history right. He is guided by Al, who appears as a hologram with data from a supercomputer named Ziggy. The series aired on NBC.

Each episode focuses on a specific person and problem, with Sam limited by the rules of the host’s body and circumstances. Leaps are triggered by unresolved factors in the timeline, and outcomes are verified through real time updates from Ziggy as history recalculates.

‘Continuum’ (2012–2015)

A law officer from the future is accidentally sent back to the present with a group of militants who aim to change corporate controlled history. The narrative weighs personal duty against wider social change and tracks a technology based approach to time travel. The show originally ran on Showcase in Canada and also aired on Syfy in the United States.

Time jump devices, future tech, and suggested multiverse rules drive the plot. The series follows cause and effect through a consistent set of consequences, with characters facing versions of themselves whose choices start to diverge as timelines branch.

‘Travelers’ (2016–2018)

Operatives from a future society send their consciousnesses into people moments before death, then continue living those lives while carrying out missions to steer history away from collapse. The series was released on Netflix.

The program uses a strict protocol that forbids altering host lives without careful review. Teams coordinate through scrambled messages that appear in the present, and a ranking system assigns tasks that build toward larger historical course corrections.

‘Timeless’ (2016–2018)

A historian, a soldier, and a scientist chase a rogue operative who uses a stolen craft to change key events in American history. The show blends real figures and dates with a clear mission structure that tracks the effects of each intervention. It aired on NBC.

The team travels in a ship designed to withstand temporal turbulence while an upgraded model gives the villains an edge. After each outing, subtle alterations ripple into the present, and the characters document those changes to maintain a record of the true sequence.

‘The Time Tunnel’ (1966–1967)

Two scientists are thrown into a controlled experiment that malfunctions, sending them unstuck across different eras. Each episode drops the pair into a new historical event while their colleagues try to retrieve them from the control center. The series aired on ABC.

Temporal displacement follows a weekly pattern, with cliffhanger transitions that link one period to the next. The control team monitors the travelers through a visual interface, providing context about the period and adjusting systems to attempt a recall.

‘Primeval’ (2007–2011)

Mysterious anomalies open portals between modern Britain and prehistoric or future eras, releasing creatures into the present. A government backed team studies and contains these events while tracking the science behind the rifts. The series aired on ITV in the United Kingdom.

The anomalies behave like fluctuating gateways that can shift locations and durations, and stabilizing them requires specialized equipment. Character arcs explore the consequences of stepping through and meeting alternate versions, with a running log of changes recorded by the team.

‘Life on Mars’ (2006–2007)

A detective from the present experiences an accident and wakes up in an earlier decade, continuing to work cases while questioning whether he is in a coma, in time, or somewhere in between. The series aired on BBC One.

Procedural cases frame the mystery as the lead encounters early forensic methods and different policing culture. Period accurate details and recurring signals from the present provide clues that point toward the truth of his displacement.

‘Ashes to Ashes’ (2008–2010)

A modern investigator suffers a near fatal event and arrives in the same past world visited by the earlier protagonist, meeting some of the same characters in a later era. The series aired on BBC One.

The show deepens the rules behind the shared reality and expands on how people arrive there. Case files and personal histories carry across, and recurring figures hint at a larger system that governs who appears and why.

‘Russian Doll’ (2019–2022)

A New Yorker repeatedly relives the same night and later follows threads that connect her family to a deeper temporal pattern. The series was released on Netflix.

Time loops function as a corrective mechanism tied to unresolved issues and inherited events. The show uses puzzles, nested timelines, and items that carry meaning across resets to chart progress through each cycle.

‘Legends of Tomorrow’ (2016–2022)

A team of misfit heroes protects history from anomalies and rogue time travelers using a time ship with a dedicated crew. The series aired on The CW.

Missions target timeline disruptions called aberrations, with the crew patching events to restore the original sequence. The ship’s artificial intelligence tracks historical records and flags deviations, while personal changes to the past create lasting effects that the team must manage.

‘The Flash’ (2014–2023)

A forensic scientist gains super speed and discovers that running at certain velocities opens routes through time. The show aired on The CW.

Time travel creates echoes like time remnants and paradoxes with alternate versions of characters. The series uses a concept of a changing present that updates as past events are altered, along with a visual timeline that helps explain branching outcomes.

‘La Brea’ (2021–2024)

A massive sinkhole in a city uncovers a link to a prehistoric landscape, separating families who work to survive and return. The series aired on NBC.

Characters discover that the world below connects to different periods and that movement through the portal carries rules that shape who can cross and when. Artifacts and structures reveal prior crossings, and a set of markers guides attempts to navigate back.

‘Terra Nova’ (2011)

A future society sends settlers to a distant prehistoric past to build a colony and relieve pressure on a damaged world. The series aired on Fox.

The time jump does not allow return travel for most people, which creates a one way frontier with its own challenges. The colony tracks cause and effect to avoid contamination of future records, while rival groups pursue different agendas around control of the timeline.

‘11.22.63’ (2016)

A teacher uses a portal to the early nineteen sixties to try to stop a major historical event, only to learn that the past resists change. The series was released on Hulu.

Rules of the portal reset the present after each return, which lets the traveler test outcomes while facing mounting pushback from the timeline. The show documents the domino effect of small changes and the cost of long stays in the past.

‘Future Man’ (2017–2020)

A janitor turned gamer is recruited by visitors from the future to prevent a catastrophic invention, using knowledge gained from a video game that mirrors real events. The series was released on Hulu.

The plot moves through multiple eras with a device that targets key moments tied to a scientific breakthrough. Characters face altered outcomes when missions go off plan, and a running log tracks versions of events after each intervention.

‘Making History’ (2017)

A present day inventor creates a portable device that opens a path to colonial America, which complicates his life when relationships and responsibilities start to cross centuries. The series aired on Fox.

Episodes focus on practical issues like language, technology, and cultural mismatches that arise from repeated trips. The device is simple to use, which leads to unintended changes that must be corrected before returning home.

‘Paper Girls’ (2022)

Four newspaper delivery girls are pulled into a conflict between rival time traveling factions the morning after a holiday. The series was released on Prime Video.

The story follows the group as they meet older and younger versions of themselves and learn the rules set by an organization that polices time. Devices called fold mechanisms move them between periods, and journals keep track of what each team knows.

‘Journeyman’ (2007)

A reporter begins to experience uncontrollable jumps to help specific people at turning points in their lives, while trying to maintain a normal home life. The series aired on NBC.

The jumps follow a pattern tied to unresolved threads that reveal themselves as he investigates. Clues carry forward between trips, like personal tokens and recurring faces, which help connect separate missions into a larger picture.

‘The Time Traveler’s Wife’ (2022)

A man with a genetic condition is pulled through time at random while his partner experiences their relationship out of order. The series aired on HBO.

The narrative documents how the pair manage records, notes, and meetings to create a shared timeline that makes sense for both of them. The condition triggers travel under stress and other factors, and episodes show how they plan around those triggers.

‘Beforeigners’ (2019–2022)

People from the Stone Age, the Viking Age, and the nineteenth century begin appearing in the present with no way back, and society adapts to the arrivals. The series aired on HBO Europe and later streamed on HBO platforms.

The phenomenon is treated as a mass temporal migration that creates legal, cultural, and scientific challenges. Investigators study the cause while tracking crimes that arise at the intersection of eras, using records to map the origins of each arrival.

‘The Lazarus Project’ (2022–2024)

An organization resets the world to a previous checkpoint when catastrophic events occur, and certain agents retain memory across resets. The series aired on Sky in the United Kingdom and later reached viewers in the United States through cable distribution.

The program sets fixed restart points and rules that limit when a reset can be triggered. Agents deal with drift between loops as personal choices diverge, and the show records each cycle to understand what led to failure or success.

‘Steins;Gate’ (2011)

A small group discovers a way to send messages to the past using consumer electronics and a laboratory experiment, which leads to unintended consequences. The television run aired on Japanese networks before reaching international audiences through streaming.

The series uses a system of world lines that shift when messages alter key decisions. A device called the Phone Microwave sends data, while a later breakthrough allows limited jumps, and characters keep a timeline chart to follow each change.

Share your favorite picks and the time travel shows you think deserve a spot in the comments.