Jump Scares
Jump Scares in Horror
A per-film jump-scare count, so you know what you are walking into.
A jump scare is a sudden sensory spike, usually a loud sound paired with an abrupt visual, engineered to make you flinch. Some viewers chase the jolt; others want dread without it. Watch Darkly compiles how many each horror film contains so you can pick either way before you press play. A jump-scare count is logged for 417 films so far, and the list grows as more are added.
Counts are compiled from published jump-scare databases, primarily Where's The Jump, with whenjumpscare as a secondary source, shown alongside our own scare profile. A film we have not logged yet carries no number rather than a guess.
By subgenre
Narrower cuts for a specific kind of horror.
The current jump-scare leaderboard
- 1The Conjuring: Last Rites202547
- 2Tarot202429
- 3The Nun II202328
- 4Evil Dead II198727
- 5Voces202027
- 6The Haunting in Connecticut200926
- 7Five Nights at Freddy's 2202525
- 8Freddy vs. Jason200324
- 9It Chapter Two201924
- 10Insidious201024
- 11The Prowler198123
- 12Drag Me to Hell200923
- 13Host202023
- 14It201723
- 15Annabelle: Creation201723
See the full ranked list of the most jump-scare-heavy horror or browse the full catalog.
Common questions about jump scares
- How does Watch Darkly count jump scares?
- Counts are almost always compiled from published jump-scare databases, primarily Where's The Jump (with whenjumpscare secondary), shown alongside our own scare profile, not estimated by an algorithm. Occasionally Watch Darkly counts a film first-hand while watching it, and that film's page says so. A film we have not logged yet carries no number and is left off the filtered lists rather than guessed.
- What counts as a jump scare?
- A sudden sensory spike engineered to make you jump, usually a loud sound paired with an abrupt visual such as a figure lunging into frame. Discrete, deliberate ones count; ambient tension and slow reveals do not.
- Can I find horror movies with no jump scares?
- Yes. The no-jump-scares list collects films with at most one jump scare on record, for viewers who want dread without being startled. The most-jump-scares list ranks the opposite end.