Friends

Friends is the most successful sitcom in television history by nearly every measurable metric. For ten seasons, six characters in a New York apartment became the most famous people on the planet. The show's cultural influence is staggering: it shaped fashion, popularized the coffee shop as social hub, and created a template for ensemble comedy that has been copied endlessly but never matched. The finale was watched by 52.5 million Americans. Two decades after it ended, it remains one of the most-streamed shows on every platform. Friends is not the smartest comedy ever made, but it is the most beloved.