Home Improvement

Series Similar to Home Improvement

If you enjoyed Home Improvement, these series share similar themes, tone, and quality. Each recommendation is scored on genre overlap, tonal match, and critical acclaim.

1. The Middle

   2009 · Comedy, Family · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile, highly rated (8.1), also on ABC.

   Forget about athletes, movie stars and politicians. Parents are the real heroes - but we think Frankie Heck, must be some kind of superhero. A loving wife and mother of three, she's middle class in the middle of the country and is rapidly approaching middle age.Frankie and her husband, Mike, have lived in Orson, Indiana, their whole lives. A man of few words (every one a zinger), Mike is a manager at the town quarry and Frankie is the third-best used car salesman (out of the three) at the local dealership. She may not be a high-powered career woman, but when it comes to her family, she'll go to just about any length. And with kids like these, she had better. There's Axl, her semi-nudist teenage son conceived while under the influence of Guns N' Roses; Sue, the awkward teenage daughter who fails at everything... but with the utmost of gusto; and their seven-year-old son Brick, whose best friend is his backpack.Sometimes it seems like everyone is trying to get to the top, or struggling not to hit bottom, but we think Frankie and her family will find a lot of love, and a lot of laughs, somewhere in The Middle.

2. Arrested Development

   2003 · Comedy, Family · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile, highly rated (8.2).

   After being passed over as partner at The Bluth Co., widower Michael resolves to quit the family business and move away to spend more quality time with his 13-year-old son, George Michael. But when his father George Bluth Sr. is arrested for shifty accounting practices and the family assets are frozen, Michael is forced to stay in Orange County to help his wildly eccentric family pick up the pieces.

3. 3rd Rock from the Sun

   1996 · Comedy, Family, Science-Fiction · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile.

   Sent to Earth to investigate civilization, an alien high commander and his quirky crew -- military officer Sally, information expert Tommy and transmitter Harry -- assume human identities to blend in. Although they possess superior intelligence, their naïveté about the human condition turns everyday events into farcical fun.

4. Modern Family

   2009 · Comedy, Family · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile, also on ABC.

   Modern Family revolves around three different types of families (nuclear, step- and same-sex) living in the Los Angeles area, who are interrelated through Jay Pritchett and his children, Claire Dunphy (née Pritchett) and Mitchell Pritchett. Patriarch Jay is remarried to a much younger woman, Gloria Delgado Pritchett (née Ramirez), a passionate Colombian with whom he has an infant son, Fulgencio (Joe) Pritchett, and a son from Gloria's previous marriage, Manny Delgado.Jay's daughter Claire was a homemaker, but has returned to the business world. She is now the chief executive of her father's previous business, Pritchett's Closets and Blinds. She is married to Phil Dunphy, a realtor and self-professed "cool dad". They have three children: Haley Dunphy, a stereotypical ditzy teenage girl; Alex Dunphy, a nerdy, smart middle child; and Luke Dunphy, the off-beat only son.Jay's lawyer son Mitchell and his husband Cameron Tucker have one daughter, Lily Tucker-Pritchett. As the name suggests, this family represents a modern-day family, and episodes are comically based on situations which many families encounter in real life.

5. The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air

   1990 · Comedy, Family · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile.

   Will Smith plays a young man transplanted from the tough streets of Philadelphia to live with his wealthy Bel-Air relatives, causing everyone to adjust how they live and think.

6. Married... with Children

   1987 · Comedy, Family, Adult · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile, highly rated (8.1).

   The less-than-lovable Bundys are a radical departure from the saccharine-sweet TV families popular since the days of Father Knows Best. With offbeat humor and unflinching honesty, Married... paints a more realistic picture of middle-class existence, warts and all. Al Bundy is a shoe salesman who is fond of frequently reliving his doubtful 15 seconds of fame on the football field. Al is terrified of the all-too-frequent amorous advances of his ditsy wife Peggy, who spends most of Al's wages at the salon and the mall. They have two teenage kids: stunning but superficial party animal Kelly and egocentric Bud. Married for 16 semi-blissful years, Peggy and Al have found that the secret to a happy marriage is to accept one another's idiosyncrasies.

7. Boy Meets World

   1993 · Drama, Comedy, Family · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile, also on ABC.

   Cory is your average guy. He has a best friend from the other side of the tracks, a teacher that constantly keeps him on his toes, and a friend named Topanga whom he has trouble understanding. With the support of his parents and his brother Eric, Cory learns to cope with the roller coaster called growing up.

8. The Goldbergs

   2013 · Comedy, Family · ended

   Recommended for similar Family profile, also on ABC.

   Before there were parenting blogs, trophies for showing up and peanut allergies, there was a simpler time called the '80s. For geeky and movie obsessed youngest child Adam, these were his wonder years, and he faced them armed with a video camera to capture all the crazy. The Goldbergs are a loving family like any other -- just with a lot more yelling. Mom Beverly is a classic "smother," an overbearing, overprotective matriarch who loves her delicious kids, but still rules this brood with 100% authority and zero sense of boundaries. Dad Murray is gruff and sometimes oblivious, parenting with half his attention span but all his heart. Sister Erica is popular and terrifying, doing her best to cover up that she's the smartest of the clan. Barry is a passionate dreamer, who maybe dreams a little too big and who always gets the short end of the stick. Adam is the youngest, a camera-wielding future director who's navigating first love, and growing up with his family. Rounding out the family is beloved grandfather Al "Pops" Solomon, the wild man of the clan, a shameless Don Juan who's learning as much from his family as he teaches them.

9. Seinfeld

   1989 · Comedy · ended

   Recommended for similar Comedy profile, highly rated (8.3).

   Seinfeld is the story of a fictionalized version of stand-up comedian Jerry Seinfeld, his life in New York City and his quirky group of friends who join him in wrestling with life's most perplexing, yet often trivial questions. Often described as "a show about nothing," Seinfeld mines the humor in life's mundane situations like waiting in line, searching for a lost item, or the trials and tribulations of dating.

10. Spin City

    1996 · Comedy · ended

    Recommended for similar Comedy profile, also on ABC.

    Spin City is a smart, sophisticated sitcom about the behind-the-scenes workings of City Hall in the biggest city in America. Workaholic Mike Flaherty is the Deputy Mayor of New York City, serving as Mayor Randall Winston's key strategist and much-needed handler. Mike runs the city with the help of his oddball staff: an anxious and insecure press secretary; a sexist, boorish chief of staff; an impeccably groomed gay activist running minority affairs; a sharp and efficient, man-crazy accountant; and an idealistic young speechwriter. Like Mike, they are all professionally capable but personally challenged.