Steins;Gate Watch Order: The Series, Steins;Gate 0 and the Movie

Time-travel shows are awkward to sequence, and Steins;Gate made it harder by releasing an alternate version of episode 23 four years after the series finished. The franchise is smaller than its reputation suggests: two TV series, one film, three extra episodes and a handful of promotional shorts. Only one sequencing decision really changes what you feel, so here is the order we recommend, the split order dedicated fans argue for, and who each suits.

Every Steins;Gate release at a glance

#	Title	Type	Length	Year	Verdict
1	Steins;Gate	TV series	24 episodes	2011	Essential, start here
2	Egoistic Poriomania (episode 25)	OVA	1 episode	2012	Warm epilogue, worth it
3	Load Region of Déjà Vu	Film	90 minutes	2013	True sequel to episode 24
4	Episode 23β: Divide By Zero	Alternate episode	1 episode	2015	Bridge into Steins;Gate 0
5	Steins;Gate 0	TV series	23 episodes	2018	Essential if the original hit you
6	Bittersweet Intermedio	Bonus episode	1 episode	2018	Optional Valentine side story
7	Cognitive Computing shorts	Promo shorts	4 shorts	2014	Skip

The watch order we recommend

1. Steins;Gate, episodes 1 to 24 (2011). White Fox's adaptation of the 2009 visual novel by 5pb. and Nitroplus drops you into Akihabara in 2010, where 18-year-old self-styled mad scientist Rintaro Okabe works out that his rigged microwave can send text messages, D-mails, into the past. Give it until episode 12. Up to there it plays as a comedy about students breaking causality for petty reasons. Once SERN realises what the group has built and sends people to collect it, the show becomes one of the tightest thrillers anime has produced, and directors Hiroshi Hamasaki and Takuya Sato spend the second half detonating details the first half quietly planted.

2. OVA episode 25, Egoistic Poriomania (2012). Set a few months after the finale and shipped with the last Japanese disc volume, this bonus episode follows the lab to Los Angeles, where Faris is competing in a Rai-Net event. Okabe has cancelled the hotel she booked for everyone and she would like to know why. Then he spots a girl who looks like Suzuha Amane, follows her, and ends up stranded out in the desert with 67 cents and a dead phone battery. Kurisu Makise drives after him in such a hurry that she forgets to fill the tank, so her car dies too, and while they wait she asks why the one dream she has never mentioned feels more real to her than her own memories. Holiday comedy on the surface, and underneath it the emotional settling-up the finale had no room for.

3. Load Region of Déjà Vu (2013). The 90-minute film is set in August 2011, a year after episode 24, with Kurisu back in Akihabara after a year in America. Then Okabe starts paying interest on all that time leaping: the visions of other world lines come longer and more often, and then he goes. The flip in perspective is what makes it worth the ticket. Kurisu is the only person who remembers anyone is missing, so for once she runs the experiment while everyone else lives happily in ignorance. For more feature-length science fiction, our pick of the best anime movies covers Akira and Ghost in the Shell.

4. Episode 23β, if you can find it (2015). This alternate take on episode 23 was slipped into a Japanese rebroadcast in December 2015, days before the Steins;Gate 0 visual novel went on sale. Its formal title is "Upon the Interface of the Missing Link", and catalogues list it as Divide By Zero. It is filed as a standalone special rather than part of the series proper, so it does not sit inside the original's episode list on streaming. Treat it as a collector's extra: worth chasing on home video, not worth putting 0 on hold for. Watched here, it works as a prologue without costing you the original's real ending.

5. Steins;Gate 0, episodes 1 to 23 (2018). The sequel series, again from White Fox and again written by Jukki Hanada, this time under director Kenichi Kawamura. It runs in the beta world line, the branch where Okabe failed and no help arrived from his future self, and it is a deliberately colder, sadder show than the original. Its last episode hands you straight back to the original's episode 23, which is the main reason we want that episode already behind you.

6. Bittersweet Intermedio (optional). Steins;Gate 0 has an unaired 24th episode, "Valentine's of Crystal Polymorphism", which shipped with the final Japanese Blu-ray volume in December 2018. It is a Valentine's side story rather than a continuation.

Both TV series stream on Crunchyroll as of September 2026, subbed and dubbed. The extras are where it gets fiddly: 23β is catalogued as its own release rather than as part of the series, and the film is not on any United States subscription service at all, so it means a purchase or a disc. Listings differ by region, so check what your account carries before planning a marathon.

The split order, and who it is for

The order forum posts have pushed for a decade runs: episodes 1 to 22 of the original, then 23β, then all of Steins;Gate 0, then back for episodes 23 and 24, then the film. It is not nonsense. It follows the causal chain rather than the release schedule, and the handover from 0 into the original's final two episodes is the best transition in the franchise.

Step	What you watch	Why it goes here
1	Steins;Gate, episodes 1 to 22	Everything up to the branch point
2	Episode 23β	The version where Okabe gives up
3	Steins;Gate 0, all 23 episodes	The beta world line that follows from it
4	Steins;Gate, episodes 23 and 24	The true ending, now fully loaded
5	OVA 25, then the film	Epilogues to the ending you just reached

Spoiler warning: the next two sections describe the shape of episode 23 and the premise of Steins;Gate 0.

What episode 23β actually changes

In the broadcast episode 23, Okabe's attempt to save Kurisu goes horribly wrong, he comes home ready to quit for good, and then he opens a video message from his own future self that shows him the way through. In 23β he never opens it. Mayuri Shiina begs Suzuha to stop hanging the prevention of World War III on one exhausted teenager, and the beta world line grinds on without a hero. That abandoned Okabe is the one Steins;Gate 0 follows, and he is also the one who eventually works out Operation Skuld and records the very message the other Okabe receives. The two stories form a closed loop rather than a straight line, which is why the word "sequel" fits 0 so badly.

Why we still put 0 last

Because 0 is written for viewers who already know how the original ends. Its charge comes from watching a version of Okabe who has already lost while you hold the memory of what he could have had, and from recognising which message he is slowly building towards. Stop the original at episode 22 and you trade that away for a clever structure, while leaving the franchise's two best episodes unwatched for twenty-three more. There is a practical snag too: 23β is not inside the series' episode list on streaming, so the order stalls at step two. Do the split on a rewatch, when the reveals are behind you and the architecture is the fun part.

What Steins;Gate 0 really is

Calling it season two sets the wrong expectations. Steins;Gate 0 opens with Okabe hollowed out: he attends lectures, avoids the lab, drops the mad-scientist act entirely, and lets neuroscientists Maho Hiyajo and Alexis Leskinen talk him into testing Amadeus, an AI trained on Kurisu's recorded memories. The premise is grief with a user interface, and the opening stretch is uncomfortable to sit through by design.

Structurally it is closer to the missing half of the original's ending than to a continuation. The 0 visual novel laid out several world line iterations but showed only a sliver of the final Okabe's road to Operation Skuld, and these 23 episodes fill that gap. Expect long stretches of talk, a fraction of the original's comedy, mid-season episodes that only pay off much later, and a finale that only lands if the original's ending is fresh. If that register appeals, our list of the best psychological anime leans the same way.

What you can safely skip

The four Cognitive Computing shorts from late 2014 are promotional pieces made with IBM, the cast wheeled out to demonstrate cognitive computing in a kitchen and a clothes shop. They are adverts, not canon. Bittersweet Intermedio is optional, and 23β can sit out a first run too, since the broadcast episode 23 carries everything the plot requires.

Where the story goes after the anime

The anime stops where 0 stops, and the rest lives in games. Steins;Gate Elite rebuilt the visual novel out of anime footage in 2018, with fresh White Fox animation for the routes the series never adapted. Steins;Gate Re:Boot goes further: the Elite scenario repaced, character art redrawn by huke, every Japanese line re-recorded, Takeshi Abo's soundtrack remade, and one extra route set on a gamma world line where the Hououin Kyouma persona was never invented. It reached Steam on 20 August 2026 to strong reviews, and English console versions for Switch 2, Switch, PS5 and Xbox Series X and S are dated 29 October 2026. Spike Chunsoft is also bringing Steins;Gate: Octet of Shifting Space west, a 2011 curio that recreates 1980s text-parser adventures, typed English commands and all. No new Steins;Gate anime has been announced as of September 2026: the TV series' 15th anniversary brought new key art and an Akihabara exhibition (17 July to 2 August 2026), while Steins;Gate 0 Elite and the Skydance live-action series, both announced in January 2020, have stayed quiet.

If the loop itself was the hook rather than the science, the original sits among the fixtures on our ranking of the best anime of all time, and Re:Zero takes the same idea of a boy who resets through repeated failure somewhere far nastier.

Frequently Asked Questions

What is the correct order to watch Steins;Gate?

Watch the original 2011 series in full (episodes 1 to 24), then OVA episode 25 Egoistic Poriomania, then the 2013 film Load Region of Déjà Vu, then the 23 episodes of Steins;Gate 0. Add the alternate episode 23β just before Steins;Gate 0 if you can find it.

Should I watch Steins;Gate 0 before episode 23 of the original?

Not on a first viewing. The popular split order pauses the original at episode 22, inserts episode 23β and all of Steins;Gate 0, then returns for episodes 23 and 24. It follows the story's causal chain, but Steins;Gate 0 is written for people who already know the original's true ending, and episode 23β is catalogued separately rather than sitting in the series' episode list. Save the split for a rewatch.

Do I need to watch Steins;Gate 0?

No. The original series and the film form a complete story on their own. Steins;Gate 0 is still strongly recommended: its 23 episodes show the world line where Okabe fails, and they explain where the video message that saves the original's ending comes from. It is slower and sadder, so expect a different kind of show.

Where does the Steins;Gate movie fit in the watch order?

Load Region of Déjà Vu is set in August 2011, a year after episode 24, so watch it after the original series. It was made in 2013, five years before Steins;Gate 0, and contains nothing from it, so it is safe either before or after 0.

How many Steins;Gate episodes are there in total?

The original series has 24 episodes plus OVA episode 25, and Steins;Gate 0 has 23 broadcast episodes plus one unaired bonus episode from the Blu-ray release. Add the 90-minute film and the alternate episode 23β and the watchable franchise runs to roughly 50 episodes.

Does Steins;Gate get better after the slow start?

Yes, and the change is abrupt. The first eleven episodes are mostly lab comedy, with the group spending its new D-mail discovery on small personal wishes. Around episode 12 the consequences arrive, SERN moves on the lab, and every earlier joke turns out to have been a planted detail.

Is a new Steins;Gate anime coming?

No new Steins;Gate anime has been announced as of September 2026. The TV series' 15th anniversary was marked with new artwork and an Akihabara exhibition in July and August 2026, not a new season. The newest release is a game: Steins;Gate Re:Boot, a remake of the original visual novel, which reached Steam on 20 August 2026 with English console versions set for 29 October 2026.