The Harry Potter Classic That Ruled Streams Last Year Is Still 2025’s Coziest Christmas Rewatch
Every Christmas, the return ticket is back to Hogwarts. Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone remains the season’s coziest staple, its early magic outlasting the controversy surrounding J.K. Rowling.
Every December, the same thing happens: people open Max, stare at the endless options, and then click on the first Harry Potter like it is muscle memory. And the numbers say it is not just nostalgia talking — it is still a juggernaut.
How big was the 2024 holiday bump?
Big. 'Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone' landed among the most-streamed movies on Max in 2024, clocking in at No. 8 on the platform's year-end list. That is the oldest film in a $9.5 billion franchise still hanging with the current hits.
Zooming out for a second: in the U.S., viewers racked up 633 million hours of British content last year, and the Harry Potter franchise led that pack. Translation: if it had a Hogwarts crest on it, Americans watched it — a lot.
And 2025? Same story.
The holiday halo did not fade on New Year's Day. According to FlixPatrol (as cited by Collider), 'Sorcerer's Stone' has kept popping up in the Top 10 movies on Max in 2025. Other Potter entries tend to rotate in and out, but the 2001 original is the steady comfort watch. Warner Bros. is surely not mad about that recurring December-to-January boost.
Why this one, specifically?
Plenty of fans will tell you 'Prisoner of Azkaban' is the best film. Fair. But as a holiday watch, the first movie hits differently. Chris Columbus leans hard into warmth and wonder: Harry's first real Christmas after the Dursleys, the Great Hall looking like a warmly lit snow globe, the Invisibility Cloak turning up as a present, that oversized Wizards' Chess set crashing around like a seasonal spectacle. It is all cozy, gentle, and shamelessly sentimental in a way December invites.
It also sells the big theme that sticks at the holidays: found family. Watching Harry get kindness, friendship, and a sense of belonging for the first time is exactly the kind of emotional payoff people want when it is cold outside. John Williams' score doing the heavy lifting does not hurt either.
Yes, the controversy is still there
The franchise has been living under the shadow of the J.K. Rowling controversy for years now. It has not stopped people from rewatching the first film when the trees go up. That split — complicated creator, comforting movie — is very much the reality.
Quick stats if you are queueing it up
- Title: Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone (2001)
- Director: Chris Columbus
- Cast: Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint, Emma Watson, Richard Harris, Maggie Smith, Robbie Coltrane, Alan Rickman
- Rotten Tomatoes: 80%
- Runtime: 2h 39m
- Where to watch: Max (if you see it called HBO Max on charts, it is the same service)
The bottom line
Two decades in, 'Sorcerer's Stone' is still the franchise's most reliable crowd-pleaser when the holidays hit. The data backs up what everyone's living room already knew. What is your go-to Potter movie in December?