Is Sherlock Season 5 Finally Happening? Benedict Cumberbatch’s One Condition And The Likely Release Window

If you are still waiting on Sherlock Season 5, join the club. No one has officially pulled the plug, but no one has hit go either. Here is where things actually stand, minus the hedging and hopeful hand-waving.

So, is Sherlock Season 5 happening?

Short version: there is no confirmed Season 5. The BBC has not renewed the show, and the last batch of episodes aired back in 2017. The door is cracked open, but it is not exactly inviting a breeze.

What the creators are saying

Steven Moffat has said he would happily start writing tomorrow if Benedict Cumberbatch and Martin Freeman were in. Mark Gatiss is less bullish, suggesting a new run might not have the same point it once did. Translation: there is interest, but there is also a reality check about whether the show needs to exist again and under what circumstances.

The real snag: calendars, not ideas

From everything the team has hinted at, the holdup is the cast, not the concept. Cumberbatch and Freeman are locked into big franchises (think Doctor Strange for him, Black Panther for him), and trying to line up their schedules at Sherlock scale is a headache. That makes a near-term comeback pretty unlikely, even if everyone likes the idea on paper.

The Benedict factor

Cumberbatch has not said yes, but he did spell out the bar Sherlock would have to clear. In a recent chat with Variety, he put it like this:

"It would take it to be better than it ever was. You leave them or yourselves wanting more. There’s always that itch to scratch, but I think it would have to be the superlative version of what we’ve already achieved."

He also joked it would take "a lot of money." So the door is open, but only if the creative pitch is next-level and the logistics make sense.

If it does happen, when could we see it?

Sherlock is three feature-length episodes per season, with cinematic production values and two leads who are constantly busy. Historically, when the show films, it takes about a year (sometimes closer to two) to hit screens. Here is the pattern so far:

• Season 1: filmed early 2010, premiered July 2010
• Season 2: filmed early 2011, premiered January 2012
• Season 3: filmed early 2013, premiered January 2014
• Season 4: filmed mid 2016, premiered January 2017

If Season 5 suddenly got the greenlight, you would be looking at at least a year from cameras rolling to release, probably more thanks to that scheduling math. And to be clear, there is no production start, no official announcement, nothing concrete on the calendar right now. So any date you see floating around is a guess.

Where to watch the existing seasons

All seasons of Sherlock are currently streaming on Disney+ and Prime Video.