Hulu might be owned by Disney but it hasn’t exactly made a name for itself in kid-friendly entertainment. That doesn’t mean there isn’t anything for kids on Hulu, though — there is a decent selection of kids movies available, from more recent blockbuster animations such as The Croods and Abominable to the classic Dreamworks hit Shrek. To save you some time, we’ve gone through the library and pulled out the best kids movies that you can stream on Hulu right now.
We’ve also rounded up the best kids movies on Netflix, the best kids movies on Amazon Prime Video, and the best kids movies on Disney+ if you don’t find what you’re looking for on Hulu.
Shaun the Sheep Movie (2015)
Mossy Bottom Farm is a perfectly ordinary farm except that the animals will do absolutely anything to get out of work. As such, the enterprising Shaun the sheep and his friends scheme a plan to put their master to sleep. But when the ruse backfires, the farmer is soon transported to the big city, with no memory of where he’s come from. Now Shaun and his friends must travel to the city to retrieve the farmer, make amends, and try to avoid landing in even more trouble.
Rotten Tomatoes: 99%
Stars: Justin Fletcher, John Sparks, Omid Djalili
Director: Mark Burton, Richard Starzak
Rating: PG
Runtime: 79 minutes
Free Willy (1993)
Want the kids to know the movies you grew up with? Free Willy is a great place to start. The classic tale follows a troubled orphan who is forced to work at an ocean-themed amusement park after getting caught vandalizing it. There, he meets Willy, an Orca that has been separated from his family. The two soon form a bond and, with the help of a whale trainer, develop some tricks. But when the greedy park owner catches wind of this interesting new attraction, he seeks to exploit the interspecies friendship for a profit.
Rotten Tomatoes: 71%
Stars: Jason James Richter, Lori Petty, Jayne Atkinson
Director: Simon Wincer
Rating: PG
Runtime: 111 minutes
Shark Tale (2004)
The extremely anthropomorphized fish may be a bit offputting to adults, but kids will love the creative stylings of the oddly dark Shark Tale. Will Smith plays Oscar, a small, underachieving fish with big dreams. So when mob-connected great white shark Frankie is accidentally killed, Oscar claims it was he who committed the crime, concocting the story with Frankie’s pacifist brother Lenny. Suddenly admired, feared, and revered by the other fish in the sea, Oscar’s lie catches up with him when Frankie’s father, Don Lino (Robert De Niro), comes knocking.
Rotten Tomatoes: 36%
Stars: Will Smith, Robert De Niro, Angelina Jolie, Jack Black
Director: Bibo Bergeron, Vicky Jenson, Rob Letterman
Rating: PG
Runtime: 90 minutes
Are We There Yet (2005)
Are We There Yet was a dud with critics, but there’s a certain charm to this commercially successful family road trip flick. (After all, they didn’t turn it into a TV show because it wasn’t popular!) Newly divorced Suzanne (Nia Long) catches the eye of Nick (Ice Cube), who attempts to curry favor with her by offering to accompany her children on a flight from Portland, Oregon, to Canada. But when the trio is mistakenly banned from the flight, Nick is forced to drive the kids instead. Hearing “Are we there yet” over and over again is the least of Nick’s worries.
Rotten Tomatoes: 12%
Stars: Ice Cube, Nia Long, Jay Mohr
Director: Brian Levant
Rating: PG
Runtime: 94 minutes
The Croods A New Age (2020)
With everything that happened in 2020, you may have missed DreamWorks Animation’s sequel to The Croods. In The Croods: A New Age, the relative harmony between the Crood family and their companion, Guy (Ryan Reynolds), is threatened when they stumble upon the Betterman family, Phil (Peter Dinklage) and Hope (Leslie Mann). The Bettermans are more advanced than the Croods, and that also puts some strain on the romance between Guy and Eep Crood (Emma Stone). But when the men of both families are kidnapped, it falls to the women to bridge the gap between them and save the day.
Rotten Tomatoes: 77%
Stars: Nicolas Cage, Emma Stone, Ryan Reynolds, Catherine Keener, Clark Duke, Cloris Leachman
Director: Joel Crawford
Rating: PG
Runtime: 95 minutes
Space Jam (1996)
If you’re avoiding the original Space Jam solely because of the very low Rotten Tomatoes score, then you’re missing out on a really fun flick. Basketball superstar Michael Jordan is actually really good at playing himself, and he’s also pretty talented at playing off of the various Looney Tunes like Bugs Bunny and Daffy Duck. The alien Monstars have challenged the Looney Tunes to a winner-take-all basketball game, but the Monstars have already stacked the deck by stealing the talent of the NBA’s best players. Somehow, Michael has to get his wacky new teammates into game shape. Fortunately, Michael’s friend Bill Murray makes a very amusing cameo at just the right moment.
Rotten Tomatoes: 44%
Stars: Michael Jordan, Wayne Knight, Theresa Randle, Danny DeVito, Billy West, Dee Bradley Baker
Director: Joe Pytka
Rating: PG
Runtime: 87 minutes
Ice Age (2002)
Nearly two decades ago, Ice Age kicked off a rare animated franchise that wasn’t produced by Disney, Pixar, or DreamWorks. Ages ago, a human infant named Roshan (Tara Strong) was separated from a tribe of humans. A friendly sloth, Sid (John Leguizamo), and his woolly mammoth companion, Manny (Ray Romano), take it upon themselves to see Roshan to safety. Diego (Denis Leary), a saber-toothed tiger, offers to help them track the humans. However, Diego’s Smilodon pack is secretly planning to kill all of the humans, as well as Manny and Sid. But when Diego comes to care about his new friends, he faces the choice of a lifetime.
Rotten Tomatoes: 77%
Stars: Ray Romano, John Leguizamo, Denis Leary, Chris Wedge, Jack Black
Director: Chris Wedge
Rating: PG
Runtime: 81 minutes
Abominable (2019)
Send your kids on an adventure to the other side of the Earth! When teenaged Yi and her friends discover a Yeti on top of her apartment building, she and her friends must embark on an epic quest to reunite the creature with its family. However, they’re not the only ones interested in the Yeti. A wealthy financier and a determined zoologist are also on the trail, bent on capturing the Yeti for their own gain.
Rotten Tomatoes: 81%
Stars: Chloe Bennet, Albert Tsai, Tenzing Norgay Trainor
Director: Jill Culton
Rating: PG
Runtime: 97 minutes
The Addams Family (2019)
The classically spooky family gets the animation treatment in this star-studded flick. Gomez, Morticia, Pugsley, Wednesday, Uncle Fester — the gang’s all here, and they’re prepping for a visit from their even creepier relatives. But when shady TV personality Margaux Needler discovers that the Addams’ hilltop mansion is standing in the way of her dream of selling all the houses in the neighborhood, she’s determined to cause trouble and drive a wedge between the family.
Rotten Tomatoes: 45%
Stars: Oscar Isaac, Charlize Theron, Chloe Grace Moretz, Finn Wolfhard, Snoop Dogg, Nick Kroll
Directors: Conrad Vernon, Greg Tiernan
Rating: PG
Runtime: 87 minutes
Trolls World Tour (2020)
DreamWorks’ Trolls franchise continues with the musical romp Trolls World Tour. Trolls Poppy and Branch discover that there are six different troll tribes scattered across six different lands, each of which is dedicated to a different kind of music. When rockers Queen Barb and King Thrash set out to destroy the worlds of funk, country, techno, classical, and pop, Poppy and Branch embark on a daring mission to unite the trolls and save the eclectic world of music.
Rotten Tomatoes: 71%
Stars: Anna Kendrick, Justin Timberlake, Rachel Bloom, James Corden
Director: Walt Dohrn
Rating: PG
Runtime: 91 minutes
Sonic the Hedgehog (2020)
Not even 2020 or a bad rap for video game movies could stop Sonic the Hedgehog from being a hit. Ben Schwartz provided the voice and motion capture for Sonic, a refuge from a world with anthropomorphic animals. While living on Earth for years, Sonic idolizes and later befriends Sheriff Tom Wachowski (James Marsden), as well as Tom’s wife, Maddie (Tika Sumpter). It’s a good thing, too, because Sonic needs all the help he can get when the evil Doctor Robotnik (Jim Carrey) plots to steal Sonic’s speed and take over the world.
Rotten Tomatoes: 63%
Stars: Ben Schwartz, James Marsden, Tika Sumpter, Jim Carrey
Director: Jeff Fowler
Rating: PG
Runtime: 98 minutes
Diary of a Wimpy Kid (2010)
Jeff Kinney’s wildly popular book series, Diary of a Wimpy Kid, was adapted as a film by director Thor Freudenthal, and it kicked off a franchise. Zachary Gordon stars as Greg Heffley, an 11-year-old who is an outcast within his own family and at his school. Greg hopes to turn things around for himself by becoming popular. However, Greg’s willingness to sell out his friend, Rowley Jefferson (Robert Capron), earns him yet another enemy and an even greater sense of isolation. Greg’s only chance to redeem himself is to earn forgiveness, if he can.
Rotten Tomatoes: 54%
Stars: Zachary Gordon, Robert Capron, Rachael Harris, Steve Zahn
Director: Thor Freudenthal
Rating: PG
Runtime: 92 minutes
Shrek (2001)
There are a ton of pop-culture jokes in Shrek to keep older audiences happy. But at its core, the story of the ogre, Shrek (Mike Myers), is timeless. Although Shrek is naturally reclusive and off-putting, he forms an odd friendship with a talking donkey named Donkey (Eddie Murphy), after Shrek is blackmailed into going on a quest to save Princess Fiona (Cameron Diaz) from a dragon. On the way home, Shrek and Fiona feel romantically drawn to each other, but she has a secret that could doom their relationship before it can begin.
Rotten Tomatoes: 88%
Stars: Mike Myers, Eddie Murphy, Cameron Diaz, John Lithgow
Director: Andrew Adamson, Vicky Jenson
Rating: PG
Runtime: 90 minutes
Missing Link (2019)
Laika’s stop-motion animated films are criminally underrated at the box office, but they’ve got a lot of heart. Laika’s latest movie, Missing Link, casts Hugh Jackman as Sir Lionel Frost, an explorer and investigator who dreams of finding the mythical Sasquatch and earning his way into the Society of Great Men. However, the Sasquatch in question has other plans. Mr. Link (Zach Galifianakis), or “Susan” as he likes to be called, simply wants Lionel’s help reuniting with his distant relatives, the Yetis, half a world away. To make the journey, Lionel will have to enlist the aid of his ex, Adelina Fortnight (Zoe Saldana), while also avoiding a hunter who is out to stop them.
Rotten Tomatoes: 89%
Stars: Zach Galifianakis, Hugh Jackman, Zoe Saldana, David Walliams, Stephen Fry
Director: Chris Butler
Rating: PG
Runtime: 94 minutes
Dora and the Lost City of Gold (2019)
If you have children, chances are good that you know all about Dora the Explorer. The live-action film, Dora and the Lost City of Gold, actually treats the TV show as canon and allows Dora (Isabela Moner) to grow up a bit. Dora has spent so much of her life exploring jungles and ancient ruins that she’s not prepared to deal with life in an ordinary high school. Much to her dismay, Dora also discovers that she has grown apart from her best friend and cousin, Diego (Jeff Wahlberg). But before long, Dora and Diego are off on a new adventure, with at least one more treasure to find.
Rotten Tomatoes: 85%
Stars: Isabela Moner, Eugenio Derbez, Michael Peña, Eva Longoria, Danny Trejo
Director: James Bobin
Rating: PG
Runtime: 104 minutes
The Secret Garden (2020)
Frances Hodgson Burnett’s classic novel, The Secret Garden, has a new adaptation that puts a fresh spin on the story. Dixie Egerickx stars as Mary Lennox, an orphaned girl who is sent to live with her uncle, Lord Archibald Craven (Colin Firth). While chafing under the rules set by her uncle’s housekeeper, Mrs. Medlock (Julie Walters), she meets Archibald’s crippled son, Colin (Edan Hayhurst), and Dickon (Amir Wilson), the younger brother of one of the estate’s servants. Together, the children find a hidden garden on the estate and begin to heal their troubled hearts.
Rotten Tomatoes: 66%
Stars: Colin Firth, Julie Walters, Dixie Egerickx, Edan Hayhurst, Amir Wilson
Director: Marc Munden
Rating: PG
Runtime: 100 minutes
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