The Best TV Shows on Arte.tv

Every Arte.tv Show Ranked From Best To Worst

Highlighting Arte.tv’s quality programming, Sur nos traces and 18h30 stand out, premiering in 2013 and 2020. From 2013 through to 2025, Arte.tv has accumulated a diverse collection of over 20 television shows. Discover the best of Arte.tv with our list of over 20 series, meticulously updated for December 2025.

  • Samuel
    Samuel (2024)9.4

    Samuel is 10 years old. He's keeping a diary, and he has a problem. His problem is that Basile told the tall Julie that Samuel loved her. Which isn't true, he doesn't care about Julie. It's only that she laughed at one of his jokes once and he thought she was nice to do so.

  • Journey into Maths Country
    Journey into Maths Country (2021)8.5

    Math is an exotic and confusing country. We speak a bizarre language, full of homeomorphisms, differential varieties, transfinite numbers. But we also find epic landscapes, dizzying ideas and even, sometimes, useful things!

  • Serengeti - La grande cavalcade des animaux
    Serengeti - La grande cavalcade des animaux (2023)8.5

  • DJ Mehdi: Made in France
    DJ Mehdi: Made in France (2024)8.5

    Self-taught composer, turntable prodigy, and visionary producer, DJ Mehdi was the only French artist to bridge the gap between two seemingly opposing worlds: rap and electro. Thirteen years after his sudden passing, this documentary series, directed by his childhood friend Thibaut de Longeville, sheds light on the role of this free spirit in the rise of these two musical scenes in France during the 1990s and 2000s.

  • The Vikings Myths
    The Vikings Myths (2024)8.5

    A fascinating journey through Norse mythology, a huge universe inhabited by gods and mysterious creatures.

  • Satoshi - The Story of Bitcoin
    Satoshi - The Story of Bitcoin (2021)8.3

    At the beginning of 2009, in the midst of the financial crisis, "Satoshi Nakamoto" put Bitcoin into circulation. He created the first decentralised and reliable cryptocurrency. In 2011 he disappeared. The Mystery of Satoshi tells the exciting history of Bitcoin and blockchain technology, from the perspective of its mysterious creator.

  • Triads: The Chinese Mafia Conquering the World
    Triads: The Chinese Mafia Conquering the World (2023)8.2

    Founded in the 17th century, the triads have built their myth around fighting China's enemies. Who are they? What role do they play in Chinese culture and history? What business are they involved in? What are their strategies?

  • Oligarchs, Putin's gang
    Oligarchs, Putin's gang (2025)8.0

    This documentary series tells the story of the rise, fall and rebirth of a handful of businessmen, those who control Russian oil and gas, whose brutality, greed and thirst for power know no bounds. Through the fates of these oligarchs, this international investigation deciphers an omnipotent and lawless economic system, shows how it reproduces itself like a tentacled octopus and adapts in order to survive the upheavals of History. By making the colossal financial windfall of black gold available to the master of the Kremlin, the oligarchs, with the complicity of their Western associates, served Putin's great ambition: to infiltrate, corrupt and dominate the West to reconstitute an Empire, that of Holy Russia.

  • Oh My Ghosts! Horror stories of Asian ghosts
    Oh My Ghosts! Horror stories of Asian ghosts (2025)8.0

    Jumping vampire, cursed dancer, snake woman, wandering child dressed in red... These evil spirits, from Southeast Asian folklore, have found a resurgence in popularity in recent decades, notably thanks to cinema and television. These six episodes invite you to discover a little-known legendary universe, whose figures continue to haunt Chinese, Taiwanese and Thai imaginations.

  • China's Wild Empire
    China's Wild Empire (2023)7.7

    The epic adventures of China’s golden snub-nosed monkeys, Tibetan antelope and Asian elephants, told across the seasons in a diversity of habitats.

  • A History of the European Rural Life
    A History of the European Rural Life (2024)7.5

    The history of the European peasantry, which has undergone many upheavals over the centuries: from its rise in the Middle Ages after the fall of the Roman Empire, through the oppression of the nobility and the Church, to the struggles for freedom and modernization in the present era.

  • 18h30
    18h30 (2020)7.2

  • Sur nos traces
    Sur nos traces (2013)7.0

  • A World Divided
    A World Divided (2024)6.5

    When World War II breaks out in 1939, several people from different countries and social backgrounds must decide which cause they want to defend.

  • El'sardines
    El'sardines (2025)6.3

  • Train Like a Girl
    Train Like a Girl (2022)5.0

    The story of how women have fought their way into the world of sport, an arena jealously guarded by men.

  • Crazy Borders
    Crazy Borders (2022)N/A

    Enclaves, loaned territories, disputed areas and microstates: This is the series that looks at places with absurd borders.

  • Stand-Up: The Laughing Therapy
    Stand-Up: The Laughing Therapy (2024)N/A

    Born over a century ago in the United States, stand-up comedy has conquered the world, spreading via the internet to screens everywhere. By channeling its satirical rage into new territories, it has captured the pulse of society, reflecting contemporary debates. Stand-up, as told by the professionals of the punchline: Blanche Gardin, Haroun, Hannah Gadsby, and many others.

  • Le Parfum d'Irak
    Le Parfum d'Irak (N/A)N/A

  • Bouchon
    Bouchon (2024)N/A

    Lolo is an actress and works hard to get there. She has just landed the leading role in a feature film. The apotheosis. When his father learns that he has cancer, and reacts to it like a child, the machine jams and everything goes wrong. His quest for serenity will transform into a quest for identity.