Within the realm of horror movies, there are few subgenres as memorable as slashers. You have a relentless, often supernatural force coming time and time again against a group of people, killing them off one by one in usually over-the-top ways.

The origins in this genre go back to the 1960s, with Peeping Tom and Psycho being the first notable examples. The early slasher films primarily focused on serial killers, something very grounded and understandable to mass audiences. The '70s leaned into iconic, recognizable monsters, while the '80s opened the doors for the supernatural villain.

As the genre moved into the 1970s, it evolved into groups of people being hunted down by a very human killer, like Michael Myers in Halloween or Leatherface in Texas Chain Saw Massacre. The suspense from the early versions of the genre were still there, but the film started moving heavily into brutal horror, with gruesome sequences and higher body counts.

As slashers movies continued throughout the years, there have been new evolutions in the slasher genre, including atmospheric horror--a deviation of gothic horror. Movies like It Follows blended atmospheric horror with a little bit of slasher mixed in. There's also been a rise in comedic slasher movies.

Looking back at the history of horror movies, here are the 19 best slasher films of all time in chronological order. And while you're looking for scares, make sure to not only check out our guide to the best cosmic horror movies, but also a look at all the new spooky video games in October! And, of course, the games you should play with the lights turned off--for added terror.

1. Psycho (1960)

In one of the first notable examples of a slasher movie, a woman on the run for embezzling money finds herself at a secluded hotel, which is owned by a man who spends his time with his overbearing mother. A detective investigates the hotel after the woman disappears.

Alfred Hitchcock's film contains one the most iconic slasher kills in the history of horror. Psycho is the building block for what slasher films would become. At this point in time, the subgenre did exist, with movies like Peeping Tom but Psycho popularized it, and other filmmakers saw the movie and took it as inspiration. Horror movies don't have to be low-budget, drive-in affairs. They can be beautiful pieces of art with complex stories.

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2. Black Christmas (1974)

This is a story you're probably pretty familiar with, even if you've never seen the movie. Before their Christmas break from college, a group of sorority sisters make plans for the holidays. They begin getting anonymous, terrifying phone calls, and the women start disappearing one by one.

First and foremost, it's worth mentioning that Black Christmas director Bob Clark has this film under his belt alongside another Christmas classic: A Christmas Story. That's right--both of these holiday movies were directed by the same person. Black Christmas set the tone and format for what would become many slasher films during the 1980s and '90s: a group of people, being hunted by a killer and taken out one by one. The victims are slowly aware of the threat, but when they realize how dire the circumstances are, they're killed. This film is a milestone for the slasher genre, and it does it exceptionally well.

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3. Texas Chain Saw Massacre (1974)

A group of friends heads to Texas to visit the grave of one of the travelers' grandfathers. They come across what they think is an abandoned house and find out the house is inhabited by a cannibalistic, sadistic family.

Black Christmas set a blueprint for the slasher genre, but Texas Chain Saw Massacre took that blueprint and added something that would also become prevalent in the genre: a memorable monster that people wanted to see more of. While Leatherface was just one of the members of this family, he stole the show. He wasn't just a person that killed people with a knife, because he used a chainsaw.

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4. Halloween (1978)

An escaped mental patient named Michael Myers returns to his small hometown to kill people on Halloween night, where he comes across Laurie Strode (Jamie Lee Curtis), who is ultimately his demise… for now.

By this point in the slasher genre, the blueprint had been drawn, and a lot of other films were copying what had been laid out, but Halloween added something more to slashers. It came with an exceptionally memorable soundtrack thanks to the music of composer and director John Carpenter. It also focused on action sequences through the eyes (or over-the-shoulder shots) of Myers. It didn't make the viewer empathetic with the villain, but it gave them a chance to see what the killer sees. It also helps that we got a phenomenal performance from Curtis as Strode.

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5. Friday the 13th (1980)

A camp with a tragic past, somehow involving the death of a boy named Jason, is reopened for a summer season for new campers, but before they populate the area, the counselors are being hunted and killed, one by one.

While this series eventually introduces Jason Vorhees as its Big Bad, the original doesn't feature him as the killer.. However, the audience is led to believe it is the resurrected body of that child doing the killing, so there's an air of mystery to the story, which involves camp counselors being killed off. The film is incredibly suspenseful, leaving you tensely waiting for the next person to get killed. Friday the 13th also does a great job of weaving in a larger story involving a mother and her son's tragedy, bringing a bit of empathy to the overall story.

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6. A Nightmare on Elm Street (1984)

A group of teenagers living in the same neighborhood all begin having dreams featuring the same nightmarish character: a burned man with blades on his gloves, and if he kills you in your dreams, you die in real life.

Nightmare on Elm Street is the first notable entry in the slasher genre to introduce the supernatural. If Freedy kills you in your dream, you die in real life. This allowed the movie to be really inventive with how the villain--in this case Freddy Krueger--killed his targets. It also helps that Robert Englund's portrayal of Krueger is incredibly fun and scary.

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7. Friday the 13th Part VI: Jason Lives (1986)

Jason Vorhees is dead, but longtime foe Tommy Jarvis doesn't believe it. Tommy heads to where Jason's body lays to rest and accidentally brings him back to life.

Jason Lives is the end of the Tommy Jarvis saga within the Friday the 13th franchise. Friday the 13th: The Final Chapter saw Jason come back to life, and he was eventually killed by Tommy. It was followed by A New Beginning, which had someone masquerading as Jason killing people around Tommy. Jason Lives sees the return of the real Jason Vorhees, who is seeking revenge on Tommy. Yes, this is an info dump, but what makes this such an important entry as a slasher is that it's a self-contained story within the grand arc of Vorhees. The kills are still over-the-top, the film leans hard into Jason's supernatural prowess, and this Friday the 13th is when the tone of the film is a bit more comedic. Introducing ridiculous kills and comedy made Jason Vorhees the character we know today. Yes, he'll stalk you and put a knife through your back, but he'll also explode through a door before ripping your heart out.

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8. A Nightmare on Elm Street 3: Dream Warriors (1987)

Teens at a mental institution are dealing with Freddy Krueger invading their dreams, but these teens have special powers and choose to fight back.

Dream Warriors is often considered to be the second-best film in the franchise after the original. While all of the movies feature the teens Freddy is trying to kill fighting back, Dream Warriors primarily revolves around a group of victims learning to fight back--a story that continues into the next entry of the series. It's really a hero's-journey story for this group of teens. Most of the Nightmare on Elm Street series deals with characters falling victim to Freddy before they can make much sense of the killer, but here there's a lot more focus on equipping its band of good guys with the information and skills they need to fight back, which makes it such a standout.

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9. Child's Play (1988)

A serial killer's consciousness gets placed inside a doll, and that doll goes on a killing spree, with the hopes of transferring his consciousness into a young boy.

Child's Play opened up the "Killer Doll" subgenre of slasher horror movies. While horror movies like that existed before (Like Dolls in 1987), Child's Play was the first to gain mainstream attention. "Chucky" became a household name. You're not expecting a little smiley-faced doll to murder everyone you love. It contains a lot of suspense and inventive kills, and without Child's Play, we wouldn't have had a wave of killer-doll movies that continue to this day.

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10. Sleepaway Camp II: Unhappy Campers (1988)

The camp murderer Angela is back as head counselor of a brand-new camp. Of course, she's "sending other counselors home" for not complying with the rules.

There's a pretty good chance you rented this from the video store back in the day because the cover featured a woman with a Jason mask and a Freddy glove hanging out of a backpack. The first film was a mystery: Who is the killer? Unhappy Campers is more about wondering when one of her peers is going to find out Angela is the killer. The hook for the film is great. Angela kills someone and then tells the rest of the group they were sent home for bad behavior. It features some unique kills and takes the "teens dying at a summer camp" story to a new level.

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11. Candyman (1992)

Taking place in the projects of Chicago, a skeptical grad student investigates rumors of a supernatural entity killing people in Cabrini-Green.

As far as slasher horror films go, this film is exceptionally layered. It focuses on lore and mythology, modern segregation and class, skepticism, and the ability to control your own fate while still failing to do so. If you say the name of the titular supernatural killer five times into a mirror, he shows up and kills you. It plays heavily into the myth of Bloody Mary, so there's familiarity for the average viewer. The villain himself ends up being sympathetic because of his tragic past--and still terrifying, mainly because he's killing people with a hook hand--so there's a level of uneasiness the viewer will feel, making this movie so engrossing.

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12. Wes Craven's New Nightmare (1994)

An ancient demon has taken on the shape of Freddy Krueger and is going after Heather Langenkamp--who played Nancy in the first Freddy movie. She shares her pain and worries with director Wes Craven, and Robert Englund--who played Freddy--and she tries to find a way to vanquish the demon.

That's right: There are three Freddy Krueger movies on this list. New Nightmare is the scariest of the Freddy Krueger movies, hands down. It's haunting and feels so much more real than the other films, as this demon is terrorizing the people that created Krueger and the first movie. It's slower-paced, and the movie boils down to these people's lives being defined by a nightmare spirit, and they're doing everything they can to escape that past. New Nightmare may not have the high kill count of previous films, but it is highly underrated.

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13. Scream (1996)

A group of friends find themselves being hunted down by a mysterious killer in a ghost mask who terrorizes them over the phone, asking them questions about horror movies.

Scream's story revolves around a couple of concepts: "What would you do if you were in a horror movie?" and "The killer is one of your friends, so who is it?" Scream's characters are aware of the tropes from every horror movie and discuss them in numerous scenes. They're also aware of the circumstances happening around them are very much like the movies they discuss. Then, there's the killer, eventually named Ghostface in later installments, which is more of a mantle than a monster that keeps showing up. They're a frightening character, as they let their victims know their intentions over the phone before attacking.

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14. Cabin in the Woods (2011)

A group of college friends head to a cabin in the woods for a fun weekend. However, they find themselves under attack by a resurrected murderous family, which was created by a secret organization that is trying to save the world from elder gods.

Cabin in the Woods isn't a comedy, but there's a lot of humor in it. The overall concept of this organization attempting to save the world by killing people who are engaging in typical horror tropes is exceptionally entertaining. The addition of an undead family picking off the group elevates the horror genre to a new level by adding in a layered story that feels uniquely different from what we've seen in the past.

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15. The Final Girls (2015)

Max and her friends attend a tribute screening of Max's late mother's 1980s horror movie. During the screening, the group of women are sucked into the movie, where a masked killer is hunting them down.

By the 2010s, slasher movies were evolving. They were mashing together comedy with horror. The Final Girls is a love letter to 1980s slasher movies while being reflective of movies of the time, pointing out the silliness of the plot, while living out that same plot as the story progresses. It's a good comedy and a great slasher overall.

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16. Happy Death Day (2017)

Tree, a college student, keeps being murdered by a masked killer, and every time that happens, she wakes up in her dorm, alive, the morning before she's killed.

There are plenty of time-loop movies: Groundhog Day, Palm Springs, Edge of Tomorrow, Naked, and more. What separates this movie from others like it is that it weaves in the slasher element along with mystery. The majority of movies like this are about the mystery of stopping the time loop. Happy Death Day has the added element of a victim trying to end her death loop, which no one else realizes is happening. Happy Death Day mixes sci-fi, comedy, and a traditional slasher in an unexpected way.

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17. Halloween (2018)

Taking place in the modern day, Laurie Strode is an adult and in hiding, thinking Myers will return to kill her. Of course she's right; he returns, seeking revenge.

What makes 2018's Halloween so great is that it completely disavows what happened after the first movie, making this a sequel to the original while retconning the rest out of existence. Over the years, the series started getting campier, and a soft reset was the best way to go. Curtis delivers another stellar performance here as a grizzled, paranoid Laurie Strode. This film goes back to its roots as a horror movie with a much more serious tone, and it's a worthy sequel to the original.

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18. Freaky (2020)

A high school student and a serial killer swap bodies after an attack with a magical knife, and the teenager (with the mind of a killer) goes on a killing spree.

Like other films on this list, Freaky mixes comedy and a slasher film exceptionally well. What sets this apart from other in this mixed genre are the performances of Vince Vaughn as The Butcher/Millie and Kathryn Newton as Millie/The Butcher. They both switch roles early on in the film and Newton is so good at playing a serial killer, and Vaughn does a great job playing a helpless teenager. While this story is entertaining on its own as a slasher flick, it's the performances by Vaughn and Newton that make it one of the best slasher-horror movies.

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19. X (2022)

In the late '70s, a group of filmmakers attempt to make a porno in a rural barn in Texas. However, once the elderly wife of the owner catches on to what's happening, she kills everyone working on the film.

X pays homage to slasher films of the past with a unique twist: The murderer is an elderly woman. This movie has the rustic atmosphere of Texas Chain Saw Massacre and follows the traditional route of slasher films from the past. It feels old and new at the same time, as director and writer Ti West has a great understanding of what makes a great slasher. One of the highlights of this movie is the performance of Mia Goth as both the final girl Maxine and the killer Pearl, which you wouldn't know by just watching the film. She is undoubtedly versatile as an actor, and it shows here.

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