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Lily Collins as Emily in Emily in Paris
17 Shows Like Emily In Paris To Watch While You Wait For Season 4

Because you can't play it on repeat forever.

by Ani Bundel
Updated: 
Originally Published: 
Stéphanie Branchu/Netflix © 2022

Netflix’s Emily in Paris increases the drama by leaps and bounds season after season. A coming-of-age dramedy starring Lily Collins, the series follows Emily as she relocates from Chicago to Paris, supposedly to bring an American point of view to an outdated French marketing firm. While her quirky ideas often bring her career success, she also learns hard lessons along the way. But Emily in Paris isn’t the only series about life and love in a big city. Here are a few shows like Emily in Paris to watch when you crave a frothy series the way Emily craves a good croissant.

Emily in Paris has packed a lot in already, and Emily hasn’t even been in Paris that long. There’s her on-and-off relationship with her downstairs neighbor, Gabriel, initially thwarted by his girlfriend Camille and now maybe by fate. There’s a tight BFF friendship with fellow ex-pat Mindy, and a not-quite-friendship, not-quite-frenemy relationship with her boss, Sylvie. And, of course, there are Emily’s attempts to date, which almost always end in disaster.

Then there’s her actual job, the impetus for Emily being in Paris in the first place. Emily’s career takes off — as does, confusingly, her Instagram presence — in the first season, forcing her to balance a more traditional career path in marketing with the influencer brand world of the 21st century. It’s a lot of fun but also a lot of drama.

In short, any show that takes its place on your watchlist needs to bring a lot to the table. Here are a few good contenders in a couple of different languages.

01

The Hook-Up Plan (Plan Coeur)

For those looking for more drama in Paris, Netflix has you covered with the series Plan Coeur, aka The Hook-Up Plan. The French romantic comedy series stars Zita Hanrot as Elsa "El" Payette, on the verge of turning 30, stuck in an uninspiring job, and hung up on her ex-boyfriend. The series starts when her friends hire a male escort to take her on a few dates, but by the time it reaches its third and final season, the drama extends every which way, not unlike Emily’s own experiences.

All three seasons of The Hook-Up Plan (Plan Coeur) are streaming on Netflix.

02

Gossip Girl (Original & Reboot)

Gossip Girl was one of The CW's most successful teen dramas when it aired from the mid-aughts into the early 2010s. It has all the fashionable beauty of Emily in Paris, with a lot of extra claws for drama. The new rebooted version with the next generation of high-end students is still working its way to the hilarious highs of the original, but it’s definitely on its way.

All seasons of both Gossip Girl seriesare streaming on HBO Max.

03

Younger

Darren Star's most recent hit before Emily in Paris was TVLand's Younger, which moved to Paramount+ for its final season. Starring Sutton Foster as a 40-something mistaken for a 20-something, it's a dive into the high-powered book publishing world. For Emily in Paris fans, it's got all the soapy drama and romance you could want.

All seven seasons of Younger are streaming on Paramount+.

04

The Eddy

Another series set in France, The Eddy is a show for viewers who need more French culture, especially from Mindy and her musician friends. Like Emily, Elliot Udo is an American transplant in Paris, a jazz musician from New York City. Instead of bringing American sensibilities to a French company, he’s trying to run one, a struggling jazz club, where he has to balance money, fame, band tensions, and his teenage daughter.

All episodes of The Eddy are streaming on Netflix.

05

The Bold Type

The Bold Type is another variation of the "living in a glamorous city and pursuing a high-profile career" premise. Inspired by the life of former Cosmopolitan editor-in-chief Joanna Coles, this is a different angle on many of the same themes covered in Emily in Paris: work, love, sex, and — of course — social media.

All five seasons of The Bold Type are streaming on Hulu.

06

Sex And The City & And Just Like That

Darren Star was famous for several shows starring teens and 20-somethings before Emily in Paris, but his biggest hit was his take on four single gals in their 30s in New York, with mega-hit Sex and the City, based on author Candace Bushnell's book of the same name. The show was so big it returned to much fanfare with a follow-up series in 2021, And Just Like That. There's a reason everyone compares EIP to SATC, and if you haven’t watched, now’s the time.

All episodes of Sex and the City and the first season of And Just Like That are streaming on HBO Max.

07

Call My Agent! (Dix Pour Cent)

Netflix’s most popular French series is Dix Pour Cent, which was renamed Call My Agent! for American audiences. Set in the film industry instead of the fashion one, four 30-something French professionals inherit a long and storied company and have to balance their love lives and work lives while dealing with demanding clients.

All episodes of Call My Agent! are streaming on Netflix.

08

The O.C.

One of the things Emily in Paris has in spades is a certain 20-something naïveté that prestige TV shows drifted away from in the last decade (this despite Emily being in her early 30s). For those looking for that sort of "party today/forget tomorrow" attitude, you would do well to head back to The O.C., another show about young people trying to make it in a high-powered industry, just without having to learn a new language.

All episodes of The O.C. are streaming on Hulu.

09

Beverly Hills, 90210

For those who want more Star-type shows, the best bet is to go back to the show that initially put him on the map, Beverly Hills, 90210. The series ran for 10 years and kicked off the entire nighttime soap phase focused on the young and fabulous living the high life in glamorous locales.

All episodes of Beverly Hills, 90210 are streaming on Paramount+.

10

Nina

Nina is a cross between Darren’s Star’s Younger and Emily in Paris. The French hit series stars Annelise Hesme as the titular Nina. After delaying her career to look after her daughter, she tries to get back to the medical career she put on hold, only to find herself at age 39 surrounded and bossed around by women 15 years her junior while younger men ask her out.

The first season of Nina is streaming on PBS Passport.

11

Sweetbitter

Sweetbitter differs from Emily in Paris in that it's in NYC instead of Europe, and it focuses more on the restaurant industry that Gabriel is trying to break into instead of Emily’s world of marketing. But otherwise, it hits all the same themes of a fast-paced, high-stress industry while living an extraordinary life.

All episodes of Sweetbitter are streaming via STARZ.

12

The Carrie Diaries

SATC was so popular that it didn’t just spawn the AJLT sequel; it also inspired Star to try a teenage prequel for The CW. AnnaSophia Robb led The Carrie Diaries as the young Bradshaw, with the series taking its cues from the original Bushnell material instead of trying to be a direct prequel to the HBO series. It only lasted two seasons, but it's still fun.

All episodes of The Carrie Diaries are streaming on The CW.

13

Interns (Hippocrate)

One of the chief complaints about Emily in Paris is how unrealistic it is about life in France for women her age. For those who would like to check out something closer to reality, there’s the French medical drama Hippocrate, which has been renamed Interns in its transition across the pond. This Grey’s Anatomy-type series set in a French hospital begins when a group of interns around Emily’s age are left to run the emergency ward during a lockdown.

All episodes on Interns are available on Prime Video’s PBS Masterpiece channel.

14

Valeria

If you search out Valeria on Netflix, the key art will make you wonder if you’ve accidentally stumbled upon SATC, and that’s not an accident. The Spanish series is based on the novel En Los Zapatos de Valeria by Elísabet Benavent, about a tight-knit group of four 30-something women struggling to make it as writers in the fast-paced city of Madrid.

The first two seasons of Valeria are streaming on Netflix.

15

Melrose Place

Star's first show about 20-somethings looking for love and getting ahead in their industry was the 1990s-era Melrose Place. Though his first hit, Beverly Hills, 90210, was teen-oriented, Melrose was firmly rooted in the post-college crowd, and it was a massive success, spawning Melrose Mania. The show’s wild popularity foreshadowed Star’s later successes with SATC and Emily in Paris.

All episodes of Melrose Place are streaming on Paramount+.

16

Katy Keene

Katy Keene, a spinoff of Riverdale, was a one-season-and-done show for The CW, but its attempt at doing a Melrose Place-like series about 20-somethings trying to make it in the fashion industry in NYC was a good try. It's got all the same vibes as Emily in Paris (and it featured Lucien Laviscount!), plus the over-the-top drama (though not the supernatural weirdness) that Riverdale is famous for.

All episodes of Katy Keene are streaming on HBO Max.

17

The Parisian Agency: Exclusive Properties

Take Emily in Paris and cross it with Selling Sunset, and you’ve got The Parisian Agency: Exclusive Properties. This reality series is about high-end French real estate (and yes, castles are involved). Like Savior, the show’s central company, which is family-owned, goes back generations and is very set on doing things “the French way.”

The Parisian Agency: Exclusive Properties is streaming on Netflix.

Emily In Paris Seasons 1 through 3 are streaming on Netflix. Season 4 is in the works.

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