There is a scary amount of horror movies on Amazon Prime Video, which is an essential reason why it is one of the best streaming services to subscribe to today. However, for every one of the platform’s best horror movies, there are even more that, by general consensus, are a horrifying experience for all the wrong reasons.
So, which of the best movies on Amazon Prime can be considered the best in horror? We figured we could help offer some assistance in answering that question by recommending our favorite creepy classics and macabre modern masterpieces that are available with an Amazon Prime subscription now.
Evil Dead Rise (2023)
A family becomes trapped inside their L.A. apartment building after one of them accidentally unleashes malevolent forces with a mysterious vinyl recording.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: With the blessing of producers Sam Raimi, Rob Tapert, and Bruce Campbell, writer and director Lee Cronin brings the Evil Dead movies out of the woods and into an urban setting with the cleverly fun and gloriously bloody Evil Dead Rise.
Stream Evil Dead Rise on Amazon Prime.
Pearl (2022)
Mia Goth gives a breathtaking and oddly sympathetic performance in the title role of a young aspiring entertainer whose homicidal tendencies get in the way of her dreams in 1918 Texas.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Before MaXXXine continued the story of hit slasher X, the origins of its main villain were revealed in Pearl, which is arguably the best installment in this trilogy of great A24 horror movies for its wonderful acting and tribute to Hollywood’s earlier years.
It Follows (2014)
Maika Monroe became one of the top Scream Queens of her time by starring as a woman hunted by an entity only she can see after inheriting a sexually transmitted curse.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Writer and director David Robert Mitchell introduced one of modern horror cinema’s scariest villains in It Follows – a thoroughly unnerving ‘80s horror throwback filled with indelible frights.
Stream It Follows on Amazon Prime.
Psycho (1960)
A woman (played by Marion Crane) takes refuge at a motel run by a seemingly charming young man (played by Anthony Perkins) and his mother.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Perhaps the most essential and iconic of Alfred Hitchcock’s movies is Psycho, which, even long after its heart-stopping twists have been spoiled, is still a masterpiece of suspense.
Stream Psycho on Amazon Prime.
Tales Of Halloween (2015)
A babysitter learns why you should never eat too much candy, a stranger teaches a young trick-or-treater his own sinister tricks, a killer’s chase is interrupted by a strange encounter, and other ghoulish tales set on one fateful All Hallow’s Eve.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: With creepy, loosely connected shorts ranging from hilarious to truly horrifying, Tales from Halloween is one of the most underrated horror anthology movies of its time.
Stream Tales of Halloween on Amazon Prime.
Ginger Snaps (2001)
A high school student (played by Katharine Isabelle) turns to her younger sister (played by Emily Perkins) for help when she shows signs of a disturbing, animalistic transformation.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Director John Fawcett’s Ginger Snaps is one of the most original and simply best werewolf movies for the way it cleverly uses lycanthropy as a symbol for developing womanhood.
Stream Ginger Snaps on Amazon Prime.
John Dies At The End (2012)
Chase Williamson and Rob Mayes play aimless slackers who become the Earth’s last hope against an epidemic of a new drug that guarantees the user a truly otherworldly trip.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Visionary filmmaker Don Coscarelli masterfully brings Jason Pargin’s (writing as “David Wong”) childishly absurd, yet inventively creepy novel to life with John Dies at the End.
Stream John Dies at the End on Amazon Prime.
Totally Killer (2023)
A modern-day 17-year-old girl (played by Kiernan Shipka) is accidentally transported to the late 1980s, where she is given the chance to stop an infamous murderer’s streak.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Picture the time travel movie classic, Back to the Future, reimagined as an ‘80s-style slasher flick and you would essentially have Totally Killer.
Stream Totally Killer on Amazon Prime.
Rosemary’s Baby (1968)
Rosemary (Mia Farrow) finds herself surrounded by unusual neighbors at her new apartment complex as she and her husband, Guy (John Cassavetes) try to conceive their first child.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: One of the most masterful examples of slow-burn horror movies is Rosemary’s Baby – an Oscar-winning adaptation of Ira Levin’s novel that exaggerates first-time parents’ common fears to devilishly frightening levels.
Stream Rosemary’s Baby on Amazon Prime.
Terrifier (2017)
Two young women (played by Jenna Kanell and Catherine Corcoran) encounter unwanted attention from a homicidal harlequin (played by David Howard Thornton) on Halloween night.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: The subgenre of creepy clown movies would never be the same after director Damien Leone’s Terrifier brought Art the Clown into the mainstream.
Stream Terrifier on Amazon Prime.
The Descent (2006)
A year after a horrific tragedy, Sarah (Shauna Macdonald) reunites with her friends for a caving trip that proves to have grave circumstances.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Few modern horror films explore grief quite as intensely and with such exquisite nuance as The Descent, from writer and director Neil Marshall.
Stream The Descent on Amazon Prime.
Goodnight Mommy (2015)
Lukas and Elias Schwartz play twin brothers who begin to suspect that their mother (played by Susanne Wuest), who recently returned from receiving cosmetic surgery, is not who she says she is.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Amazon Prime also has an English-language remake of Goodnight Mommy, but the original from Austrian filmmaking duo Veronika Franz and Severin Fiala is the more creepily atmospheric and dread-inducingly brutal.
Stream Goodnight Mommy on Amazon Prime.
House On Haunted Hill (1959)
A wealthy eccentric challenges a group of strangers to spend a single night in a spooky old house for a large monetary prize.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Not to be confused with The Haunting of Hill House, director William Castle’s House on Haunted Hill is one of horror movie icon Vincent Price’s most essential and fun thrillers.
Stream House on Haunted Hill on Amazon Prime.
Bones And All (2022)
A pair of young road trippers (played by Timothée Chalamet and Taylor Russell) bond over their shared, unusual appetites in the early 1980s.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Chalamet reunites with Call Me By Your Name director Luca Guadagnino for another gripping period drama about forbidden love, but of a more viscerally shocking and grotesque sort, with Bones and All.
Stream Bones and All on Amazon Prime.
Smile (2022)
Sosie Bacon makes a stellar horror debut as a therapist who fears she may be on the brink of losing her sanity – or her life – after witnessing a traumatic event in her office.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Based on writer and director Parker Finn’s short film Laura Hasn’t Slept, Smile is one of the best horror movies of 2022 and one of the genre’s most pleasant surprises from that year.
The Collector (2009)
Desperate for money, thief-turned-repairman Arkin (Josh Stewart) plans a seemingly simple burglary job at his wealthy new employers’ house, only to fall prey to the increasingly elaborate traps of a sadistic killer who has confined the resident family inside.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: One of the best movies that fans of the Saw movies should check out is The Collector – writer and director Marcus Dunstan’s brutal, subversive take on the home invasion thriller.
Stream The Collector on Amazon Prime.
Absentia (2011)
Several years after her brother-in-law went missing, a recovering addict (played by Katie Parker) begins to discover the shocking truth behind the disappearance.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Fans of Mike Flanagan’s movies and TV shows who have not seen the sadly underappreciated Absentia are missing out on one of the filmmaker’s most heartbreaking and horrifying titles.
Stream Absentia on Amazon Prime.
Hell House LLC (2015)
Interviews with surviving witnesses and raw footage captured by the victims expose the mysteries surrounding a small-town haunted house attraction and chronicle the events leading to its ill-fated opening night.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: There are many great found footage thrillers on Amazon Prime, but my personal favorite of the bunch (and of all time) is easily writer and director Stephen Cognetti’s Hell House LLC for its dread-inducing pace, indelibly creepy imagery, and remarkably convincing writing and performances.
Stream Hell House LLC on Amazon Prime.
Hellraiser (1987)
A young woman (played by Ashley Laurence) discovers that her stepmother (played by Clare Higgins) and her uncle (played by Sean Chapman) are lovers who are part of a conspiracy involving murder, a strange puzzle box, and a group of sadomasochistic mutants from another dimension.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Horror maestro Clive Barker made his directorial debut with the disturbing cautionary romance, Hellraiser – an adaptation of his own novella that introduced one of the most iconic horror movie villains, who came to be known as Pinhead (Doug Bradley).
Stream Hellraiser on Amazon Prime.
Saint Maud (2021)
Desperately seeking redemption, a young Welsh nurse named Maud (Morfydd Clark) believes she has found her chance when she is assigned to care for a terminally ill dancer (played by Jennifer Ehle) and decides to pass her newfound religious beliefs onto her.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Not everything is quite as it seems in writer and director Rose Glass’ A24-produced thriller, Saint Maud, which is considered one of 2021’s best horror films for its masterful pacing, thought-provoking commentary on faith, Clark’s stellar performance, and the film’s startling final moment.
Stream Saint Maud on Amazon Prime.
Suspiria (2018)
A remake of the Dario Argento-directed classic, the film stars Dakota Johnson as a young American woman who is accepted into an elite dance company in Berlin. What she doesn’t know is that the academy is operated by a coven of witches, and it’s a truth she must discover before it is too late.
Why it is one of the best horror movies on Amazon Prime: Most missed out on Luca Guadagnino's Suspiria when it was in theaters, and that’s a shame because it is a twisty, mysterious, and chilling thriller that features an absolutely remarkable and jaw-dropping conclusion.
Stream Suspiria on Amazon Prime.
There are many great horror movies to be found on many different streaming platforms. However, the titles above might be enough to convince you to make Amazon Prime Video your prime location for a good scare.
