The Best Monster Movies on Free Services

What it's about: A boy imagines a monster that helps him deal with his difficult life and see the world in a different way.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (IMDb TV) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: A scientific expedition searching for fossils along the Amazon River discover a prehistoric Gill-Man in the legendary Black Lagoon. The explorers capture the mysterious creature, but it breaks free. The Gill-Man returns to kidnap the lovely Kay, fiancée of one of the expedition, with whom it has fallen in love.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (PopcornFlix) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: Paris, 1910. Emile, a shy movie projectionist, and Raoul, a colourful inventor, find themselves embarked on the hunt for a monster terrorizing citizens. They join forces with Lucille, the big-hearted star of the Bird of Paradise cabaret, an eccentric scientist and his irascible monkey to save the monster, who turns out to be an oversized but harmless flea, from the city's ruthlessly ambitious police chief.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: In 1959, an alien experiment crashes to earth and infects a fraternity member. They freeze the body, but in the modern day, two geeks pledging a fraternity accidentally thaw the corpse, which proceeds to infect the campus with parasites that transform their hosts into killer zombies.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Sony Crackle) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: Six years ago NASA discovered the possibility of alien life within our solar system. A probe was launched to collect samples, but crashed upon re-entry over Central America. Soon after, new life forms began to appear and half of Mexico was quarantined as an infected zone. Today, the American and Mexican military still struggle to contain "the creatures," while a journalist agrees to escort a shaken tourist through the infected zone in Mexico to the safety of the U.S. border.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a subscription service (Monsters Nightmares) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 8 services (iTunes, Google Play & 6 others).

What it's about: A new drug promises out-of-body experiences, but users are coming back changed forever, and an otherworldly invasion of Earth is underway.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Vudu) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 8 services (iTunes, Google Play & 6 others).

What it's about: An adventure set in the early part of the 20th century, focused on a popular novelist and her dealings with would-be suitors, the cops, monsters, and other distractions.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Shout Factory TV & Tubi TV), stream on a subscription service (Shout Factory TV) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: Picking up immediately after the events in Resident Evil: Retribution, Alice (Milla Jovovich) is the only survivor of what was meant to be humanity's final stand against the undead. Now, she must return to where the nightmare began - The Hive in Raccoon City, where the Umbrella Corporation is gathering its forces for a final strike against the only remaining survivors of the apocalypse.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Sony Crackle) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 8 services (iTunes, Google Play & 6 others).

What it's about: The 9th Godzilla film was the last made by the original Godzilla creators, and was meant to be a grand finale. Aliens have released all the giant monsters from their imprisonment on Monster Island and are using them to destroy earth's major cities. It is up to the daring crew of the super rocket ship X-2 to infiltrate the aliens' headquarters before the Earth monsters and King Ghidrah annihilate the planet.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Starz, ConTV & The Criterion Channel), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Starz & IFC) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 3 services (Prime Video, Vudu & PlayStation Store).

What it's about: A government funded project looks into using psychics to enter people's dreams, with some mechanical help. When a subject dies in his sleep from a heart attack Alex Gardner becomes suspicious that another of the psychics is killing people in the dreams somehow and that is causing them to die in real life. He must find a way to stop the abuse of the power to enter dreams.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (PopcornFlix, Shout Factory TV & Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video & Kanopy) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 8 services (iTunes, Google Play & 6 others).

What it's about: A troubled young man is drawn to a mythical place called Midian where a variety of monsters are hiding from humanity.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video & Shout Factory TV) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 4 services (iTunes, Google Play & 2 others).

What it's about: Mysterious and unearthly deaths start to occur while Professor Saxton is transporting the frozen remains of a primitive humanoid creature he found in Manchuria back to Europe.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video, Fandor, ConTV & 1 other) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 3 services (iTunes, Google Play & Microsoft).

What it's about: New York police are bemused by reports of a giant flying lizard that has been spotted around the rooftops of New York, until the lizard starts to eat people. An out-of-work ex-con is the only person who knows the location of the monster's nest and is determined to turn the knowledge to his advantage, but will his gamble pay off or will he end up as lizard food?

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (PopcornFlix, Shout Factory TV & Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video, Showtime, Shout Factory TV & 1 other), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Showtime) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: Looking for any way to get away from the life and town he was born into, Tripp, a high school senior, builds a Monster Truck from bits and pieces of scrapped cars. After an accident at a nearby oil-drilling site displaces a strange and subterranean creature with a taste and a talent for speed, Tripp may have just found the key to getting out of town and a most unlikely friend.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Epix) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: A young girl sent to live with her father and his new girlfriend discovers creatures in her new home who want to claim her as one of their own.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Sony Crackle) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: It is 1879 in the Dakota Territories, a band of men who set out to find and recover a family of settlers that has mysteriously vanished from their home. Expecting the offenders to be a band of fierce natives, but they soon discover that the real enemy stalks them from below.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Hulu), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Epix) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: The German film director Werner Herzog sets out to the Scottish Highlands to make a documentary, "Enigma of Loch Ness", exploding the myth of the Loch Ness Monster. Meanwhile, another documentary film crew is making a film about Werner Herzog, and we see the production of "Enigma" from their point of view. Shooting on a rented boat, tensions begin to rise as director Herzog and his producer, Zak Penn, find themselves at cross-purposes on the black surface of Loch Ness. Things get very edgy when the film crew starts seeing shapes in the murky water.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Epix) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 1 service (iTunes).

What it's about: Set in 1965 New England, a troubled girl encounters mysterious happenings in the woods surrounding an isolated girls school that she was sent to by her estranged parents.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 4 services (iTunes, Google Play & 2 others).

What it's about: A documentary filmmaker turns his lens on an enigmatic conspiracy theorist who claims he's found the entrance to a vast underground city populated entirely by monsters.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video & Shudder) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 8 services (iTunes, Google Play & 6 others).

What it's about: They're not human. But they hunt human women. Not for killing. For mating.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 5 services (iTunes, Google Play & 3 others).

What it's about: A writer of horror stories is invited to a "monster club" by a mysterious old gentleman. There, three gruesome stories are told to him; between each story some musicians play their songs. In the end, it's recognized he's the greatest monster of all ...

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video & Shout Factory TV) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 1 service (Prime Video).

What it's about: Young monster kids try to make peace between the world of humans and the world of the monsters.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu), stream on a subscription service (Kanopy) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: A rash of bizarre murders in New York City seems to point to a group of grotesquely deformed vagrants living in the sewers. A courageous policeman, a photo journalist and his girlfriend, and a nutty bum, who seems to know a lot about the creatures, band together to try and determine what the creatures are and how to stop them.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a subscription service (ConTV, ScreamBox & Shudder) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 4 services (iTunes, Prime Video & 2 others).

What it's about: The Haunted World of El Superbeasto is an animated comedy that also combines elements of a horror and thriller film. It is based upon the comic book series created by Rob Zombie that follows the character of El Superbeasto and his sexy sidekick sister, Suzi-X, voiced by Sheri Moon, as they confront an evil villain by the name of Dr. Satan.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 5 services (iTunes, Prime Video & 3 others).

What it's about: Underwater deep-sea miners encounter a Soviet wreck and bring back a dangerous cargo to their base on the ocean floor with horrifying results. The crew of the mining base must fight to survive against a genetic mutation that hunts them down one by one.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 3 services (iTunes, Prime Video & Vudu).

What it's about: Once again tampering with mother nature to disastrous results, Dr. Herbert West continues his research while serving time in a maximum security prison for his previous exploits. West's limited prison-cell experiments are suddenly interrupted by the arrival of a new prison doctor and the brother of the girl who suffered from West's experiments 13 years earlier.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a subscription service (Tribeca Short List) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: On a deep space mining mission to a remote planet, an ancient religious relic - thought to be proof of the existence of God - is unearthed and brought aboard. When the unholy artifact unleashes a long-dormant alien race, its glimpse of Heaven transforms the ship into a living Hell. A prequel to the events of the 2008 video game Dead Space.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 5 services (iTunes, Prime Video & 3 others).

What it's about: After receiving word about a mysterious carcass/skeleton unearthed in the Arizona desert, a father and his daughter decide to remove it from the burial grounds for further study. Once they do so, they, as well as the town, are besieged by a colony of gargoyles living in some nearby caverns.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (PopcornFlix, Shout Factory TV & Tubi TV).

What it's about: A shipwrecked sailor stumbles upon a mysterious island and is shocked to discover that a brilliant scientist and his lab assistant have found a way to combine human and animal DNA with horrific results.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Vudu) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: Godzilla saves Tokyo from a flying saucer that transforms into the beast Orga.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Sony Crackle) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 8 services (iTunes, Google Play & 6 others).

What it's about: A young woman is driving alongside a lake. She has an accident and the car plunges into the water. Her body is then possessed by the spirit of an 18th-century witch who was killed by local villagers, and is bent on avenging herself on them.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV) & rent or buy from $0.99 on 1 service (Prime Video).

What it's about: A team of U.S. archaeologists unearths an ancient pyramid buried deep beneath the Egyptian desert. As they search the pyramid's depths, they become hopelessly lost in its dark and endless catacombs. Searching for a way out, they become desperate to seek daylight again. They come to realize they aren't just trapped, they are being hunted.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: A young child is terrified to discover that a planned family trip is to be haunted by vile plant-eating monsters out of his worst nightmare...

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 4 services (iTunes, Prime Video & 2 others).

What it's about: John Hall is a drifter who wanders into a small town in Maine. He needs a job and decides to seek employment at the community's top business: a large textile mill. He is hired to work the "graveyard shift" -- from around midnight to dawn -- and, along with a few others, he is charged with cleaning out the basement. This task strikes the workers as simple enough, but then, as they proceed deeper underground, they encounter an unspeakable monstrosity intent on devouring them all.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Vudu), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Epix) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: Criminals and a beautiful but cunning hitchhiker must battle a supernatural force known as the Reaper.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 2 services (iTunes & Google Play).

What it's about: When three college guys get caught spying on a sorority ritual, they're forced to accompany the pledges on their next assignment: stealing a trophy from a bowling alley. But the token they pinch has a devilish imp who makes their lives a living hell.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a subscription service (Full Moon & Shudder) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 1 service (Prime Video).

What it's about: Wealthy big game hunter Tom Newcliffe has tracked and killed practically every type of animal in the world. But one creature still evades him, the biggest game of all - a werewolf.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (SnagFilms) & stream on a subscription service (Fandor).

What it's about: A nuclear explosion in the far north unleashes Gamera, the legendary flying turtle, from his sleep under the ice. In his search for energy, Gamera wreaks havoc over the entire world, and it's up to the scientists, assisted by a young boy with a strange sympathic link to the monster, to put a stop to Gamera's rampage.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (SnagFilms), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 2 services (Prime Video & FandangoNOW).

What it's about: After his family moves to a new house, a young boy discovers a mysterious book that details a curse hanging over the date of Saturday the 14th. Opening the book releases a band of monsters into the house and the family must join together to save themselves and their neighborhood.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 1 service (Prime Video).

What it's about: The warrior Deathstalker is tasked by an old witch lady to obtain and unite the three powers of creation - a chalice, an amulet, and a sword - lest the evil magician Munkar get them and use them for nefarious purposes. After obtaining the sword, Deathstalker joins with other travelers going to the Big Tournament to determine the strongest warrior. The false king holds the true princess in captivity, and plots to have Deathstalker killed, and Deathstalker must fight to free the princess.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 1 service (Prime Video).

What it's about: After a treacherous expedition to retrieve a giant opal, disaster strikes as the opal reveals itself to be an egg which spawns Barugon, demon dog from Hell! Armed with a deadly tongue and cold beams, Barugon wreaks havoc on Japan. Gamera comes to save the day.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu), stream on a subscription service (Shout Factory TV) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 1 service (iTunes).

What it's about: A crazed scientist experimenting with a rage virus on innocent victims in a laboratory in the woods. When his monstrous subjects escape and vultures devour their remains, they became mutations seeking to feed on humans.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (PopcornFlix), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 4 services (Google Play, Prime Video & 2 others).

What it's about: Welcome to Monsterland! A terrifying place where savage beasts, carnivorous creatures, and grotesque abominations are the new normal; and the human race is now at the bottom of the food chain.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: Giant lava breathing tarantulas – Lavalantulas – erupt out of ancient volcanos in the Santa Monica Mountains, raining death and destruction upon Los Angeles. With the City of Angels on the verge of incineration, only a washed up ‘90s action hero actor stands in the way of this monstrous swarm of bloodthirsty creatures who burn their victims alive.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (PopcornFlix, Tubi TV & Vudu), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 3 services (Google Play, Prime Video & YouTube).

What it's about: A man receives a mysterious box containing a terrible secret, a creature that will kill everyone else in his family unless he passes it on to someone he loves to continue its never-ending circulation.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 7 services (iTunes, Google Play & 5 others).

What it's about: A military experiment to create a race of super-warriors goes awry, as legions of murderous zombies are unleashed upon a suburban neighborhood.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV & Vudu), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video) & rent or buy from $1.99 on 6 services (iTunes, Google Play & 4 others).

What it's about: A crew of scientists arrives on a far, cold planet to examine archaic artifacts of unknown origin. They discover that their German enemies already have a ship there. When they seek their help after a failed landing, they only find the Germans’ bodies, obviously slaughtered by one of the archaic creatures, awoken to new life. Now the alien is after them.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video & Fandor), stream on a popular TV everywhere service (Epix) & rent or buy from $3.99 on 2 services (iTunes & Prime Video).

What it's about: A babysitting uncle tells his charges three horror stories--about a killer witch, Little Red Riding Hood and a werewolf, and a story about "Goldi Lox" and the three bears.

Where to Watch: Available to watch free online (Tubi TV), stream on a popular subscription service (Prime Video & Shout Factory TV) & rent or buy from $2.99 on 5 services (iTunes, Google Play & 3 others).