We smiled, we swooned, we kicked our feet, and we blew up our group chats. Romance has that effect, and in 2025, we were presented with plenty of onscreen couples that had us texting #GOALS and daydreaming about what could be. 

There were the will-they-won’t-theys, the enemies-to-lovers, the starcrossed sweethearts, the instant-spark sizzlers, the forever-destined, the doomed-from-the-starts, and some more that will live on in our minds (or our fanfic.) Whatever the love story, it lingered long after the credits rolled and had us coming back for more. 

Let’s toast to the gentle glances and quiet confessions, the flirting and the heated chemistry, as we take a look at a few of the 2025 romances from Netflix movies and shows that we rooted for hardest this year.

Brick

Tim & Olivia
From the start of this mind-bending German thriller, Tim (Matthias Schweighöfer) and Olivia (Ruby O. Fee) seem doomed as a couple. They’ve endured unthinkable loss together and the pain has pulled them apart. But when they are trapped in their apartment building by strange bricks that have sealed it off, they have no choice but to work together to find a way out and survive. Little by little, we see more of what brought them together in the first place: his intelligence, her take-control attitude. At first, we just want Tim and Olivia to figure out this puzzle, but by the end, we want them not only to live on, but to love on.

Brick

1h 40m   TV-MA   2025

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FOREVER

Keisha & Justin
Young love looks drastically different from how it did even 20 years ago. Smartphones, social media — even the lack of safe spaces for young people to congregate — all make it hard for teens to meet and connect. Which is maybe why watching Keisha (Lovie Simone) and Justin (Michael Cooper Jr.) find each other on New Year’s Eve of their senior year and overcome a dreadful first date is so meaningful. First love at that age might not be forever, but in this modern world, it's a wondrous thing to behold. 

FOREVER

8 Episodes   TV-MA   2025

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The Four Seasons

Danny & Claude
In a series about old friends and the ups and downs of marriage, it can be hard to find much optimism about love. But watching Danny (Colman Domingo) and Claude (Marco Calvani) navigate a health scare and the realities of aging in their relationship, we can’t help but want them to figure it all out. The details of their personalities — Claude’s well-intentioned smothering, Danny’s little white lies to get his way — are just part of what makes them so real as a couple. And the fact that their open relationship isn’t the source of their drama also makes the series feel refreshingly progressive. 

The Four Seasons

1 Season   TV-MA   2025

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Frankenstein

The Creature & Elizabeth
One of the year’s most swoon-worthy couples isn’t actually a couple, at least not on film — though they absolutely are if the internet has anything to say about it. Jacob Elordi’s turn as The Creature in Guillermo del Toro’s Frankenstein is inspired, but his interactions with Mia Goth’s Elizabeth have captured fans’ hearts and imaginations: the tender moment they share over a fallen leaf. The way he says her name. And, of course, the romantic tenderness that imbues their final scene together. Some people wait a lifetime for this kind of connection.

Frankenstein

2h 32m   R   2025

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KPop Demon Hunters

Rumi & Jinu
While not every couple we cheered on this year made it to the finish line, there were few we wanted to see make it more than Rumi (Arden Cho) and Jinu (Ahn Hyo-seop). Jinu’s a demon from the wrong side of the tracks — er, underworld. Rumi’s a demon hunter at war with her true self. In each other they find someone who understands their darker sides. As they sing in their oh-so-romantic ballad, “Free,” together they can “let the past be the past ’til it’s weightless.” Swoon.

KPop Demon Hunters

1h 39m   PG   2025

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Perfect Match

AD & Ollie
They were in completely different seasons –– and countries –– when they started their reality TV love journeys, but these two still found their way to each other. Amber Desiree "AD" Smith (Love is Blind Season 6) and Ollie Sutherland (Love is Blind: UK Season 1) both made it all the way down the aisle during their respective seasons, and both were blindsided when their partners called things off at the altar. This certainly gave them plenty to connect over when the couple met as contestants on Perfect Match Season 3. Though they’d already made their relationship (and wedding, and baby bump) public by the time the season premiered, those revelations make it all the more sweet to watch them fall in love in real time.

Perfect Match

3 Seasons   TV-MA   2023

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Love on the Spectrum

Connor & Georgie
It’s hard to choose from the many moments in this series that had our hearts swelling, but in Season 3, Connor and Georgie had us cooing at our screens and squealing with delight. When the two first meet, watching ducks and turtles at a pond and bonding over shared interests, it’s clear they’re on similar wavelengths. And on their second date, when Connor excuses himself for a moment and repeats, “Where have you been all my life?” to himself over and over, there’s not a soul out there who could say that isn’t the type of romantic connection everyone dreams of.

Love on the Spectrum

4 Seasons   TV-14   2022

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Lost in Starlight

Nan-young & Jay
In what was truly the year’s farthest-reaching romance, Nan-young (Kim Tae-ri) and Jay (Hong Kyung) showed us a love across the stars. In a futuristic society, Nan-young dreams of going to Mars, but because her mother went missing during a mission to the red planet, she isn’t allowed to. Feeling aimless, she looks for someone who can fix her parents’ broken vintage record player. She collides –– literally –– with Jay, who offers to fix it and then, after a few meetings, chases her in the rain, determined not to let her get away. The two seem truly destined, but when the opportunity arises for Nan-young to live out her dreams, their connection is tested in the extreme.

Lost in Starlight

1h 38m   PG   2025

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My Oxford Year

Jamie & Anna
She’s got a life plan; he’s got a knack for throwing plans out the window. Jamie (Corey Mylchreest) and Anna’s (Sofia Carson) romance is one of poetry, spontaneity, and embracing the unknown. If the truest loves are the ones in which lessons are learned and lives are changed, these two have a love story for the ages. Watching them fall for each other among the stacks in old libraries, or while reading to each other in bed, or when sneaking kisses under the gargoyles of Oxford’s ancient buildings, is the sort of storied affair most of us only dream of. We laughed, we cried, we pressed replay.

My Oxford Year

1h 52m   PG-13   2025

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Nobody Wants This

COURTESY OF NETFLIX

Sasha & Esther
Of course, we’re anxiously rooting for Noah (Adam Brody) and Joanne (Kristen Bell) in this series about a sex podcaster and a rabbi who fall in love. But in Season 2, Noah’s brother, Sasha (Timothy Simons), and his wife, Esther (Jackie Tohn), are the couple who had us on a roller coaster of emotion. At a mature stage in their marriage, these two are grappling with whether or not they want another child before time runs out. Esther is trying to be at least mildly supportive of Sasha’s friendship with Morgan (Justine Lupe), but internally, she’s working through her own identity issues, having been with Sasha since they were both young. Only time will tell where their story leads, but this season’s arc has us crossing our fingers that love wins in the end.

Nobody Wants This

2 Seasons   TV-MA   2024

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Sullivan's Crossing

Maggie & Cal
They’ve endured many ups and downs, and their journey in Season 3 of Sullivan’s Crossing was no different, but this is one couple we’ll never give up hope for. After two seasons of wondering if the timing would ever be right for Maggie (Morgan Kohan) and Cal (Chad Michael Murray), we finally get the blissful happiness we’ve wanted for these two. Through life’s hardships, the pull and tug of ambition vs. love, and, of course, a few miscommunications, they support each other in the healthiest ways possible. That Season 3 cliffhanger has us slack-jawed, but ultimately, this couple has proven they can overcome anything.

Sullivan's Crossing

3 Seasons   TV-14   2023

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Wayward

Alex & Laura
If you made it to the end of Wayward, the quirky psychological thriller series from Mae Martin, you may question this couple’s inclusion on the list. But Alex (Martin) and Laura (Sarah Gadon) stick together in the midst of odd goings-on in their new hometown, an impending baby, and even a violent death in their own home. Sure, they aren’t always fully honest with each other: Alex is trying to uncover a conspiracy at the academy and Laura clearly has a history she hasn’t fully disclosed. But despite the red flags, it’s hard not to want to see this non-conventional couple (in the early 2000s, no less) somehow make it through the craziness and end up a happy family on the other side.

Wayward

Limited Series   TV-MA   2025

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When Life Gives You Tangerines

Ae-sun & Gwan-sik
This is the sort of quietly epic love that feels pure and true: two kids, growing up on the same small island off the coast of Korea in relative poverty during the Korean War. Ae-sun (IU) endures loss, her life’s dreams shattered, and the pressures of caring for her family, all at a young age. But with the love of Gwan-sik (Park Bo-gum), who is steady and unwavering, she finds a fuller life than she could have imagined. She’s poetic and outspoken, he’s quiet and steadfast. Told over an entire lifetime, their story always has us wishing all the best for these two.

When Life Gives You Tangerines

Limited Series   TV-14   2025

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You

Joe & Bronte
So, hear us out. Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) has had a new woman to obsess over every season, so it’s no surprise when, in Season 5, Bronte (Madeline Brewer) wanders into his bookstore and into his life — and Joe makes her his new project. The reasons Bronte is a perfect fit for Joe are the same reasons she is the worst thing that could ever happen to him. After five seasons, watching Joe figure out ways to fix a woman while his internal dialogue regales us with her many virtues was just starting to feel dangerously close to cliché — when we unexpectedly get new information about Bronte. And suddenly, we’ve never wanted Joe to fall harder. He might finally experience the love he truly deserves (wink, wink).

You

5 Seasons   TV-MA   2018

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