Netflix Unveils Teaser for Final Season of Stranger Things, Confirming 2025 Release and Major Story Developments

On Wednesday, Netflix released an exciting new teaser for Stranger Things Season 5 in celebration of the platform’s annual "Stranger Things Day," observed on November 6—the date when Noah Schnapp's character, Will Byers, vanished in the show’s storyline from Hawkins, Indiana. The teaser confirms that the much-anticipated final season will debut in 2025. Despite fans’ concerns about delays due to Hollywood’s recent actor and writer strikes, they can rest assured that the remaining episodes will air next year as scheduled.

One major update for the upcoming season is a time jump in the storyline, marking the fall of 1987 as the starting point. Season 4’s events unfolded in March 1986, and a leap forward was likely due to the natural aging of the cast. Co-creator Ross Duffer, who, along with his brother Matt, helms the series, previously hinted at this necessity, telling TV Line in 2022: “Ideally, we’d have shot [seasons 4 and 5] back to back, but there was just no feasible way to do that.”

The previous season ended with Will, Hopper (David Harbour), Joyce (Winona Ryder), Nancy (Natalia Dyer), Jonathan (Charlie Heaton), Eleven (Millie Bobby Brown), and Mike (Finn Wolfhard) gathered in a field, with Max (Sadie Sink) comatose in the hospital. Hinting at her character’s role in the upcoming season, Sink cryptically shared, “They love having me run. That’s all I’ll say.”

The teaser also revealed the title of the first episode, "The Crawl." Netflix partially unveiled the second episode’s title, indicating it starts with "The Vanishing of…” The final season will reunite the main cast along with iconic newcomer Linda Hamilton from The Terminator series, and fresh faces including Nell Fisher, Jake Connelly, and Alex Breaux. Familiar faces Caleb McLaughlin, Gaten Matarazzo, Joe Keery, Maya Hawke, Brett Gelman, Priah Ferguson, Jamie Campbell Bower, Cara Buono, and Amybeth McNulty will also reprise their roles.

Speaking of the final season’s scale, Bower, who will return as Vecna, remarked in the teaser, “If season 4 was big, season 5 definitely feels bigger.” This anticipation builds excitement for a season poised to deliver the series’ grand conclusion.