What is Rotten Tomatoes?

Rotten Tomatoes is a widely recognized American website that serves as a central hub for aggregating reviews of films and television shows. It gathers opinions from a vast network of professional critics and, separately, from its audience members, presenting these insights in an easily digestible format. The site's primary goal is to help moviegoers and TV viewers make informed decisions about what to watch by offering a quick overview of critical consensus. The most iconic feature of Rotten Tomatoes is its "Tomatometer" score, which represents the percentage of professional critics who gave a film or TV show a positive review. This score is visually represented by either a fresh red tomato (for positive reviews) or a splattered green tomato (for negative reviews), directly referencing the historical practice of audiences throwing rotten produce at poor stage performances. This simple, visual system has made the site incredibly popular and influential in the entertainment world. Beyond the Tomatometer, Rotten Tomatoes also provides an "Audience Score," which reflects the percentage of verified users who rated a film or show positively. This distinction allows users to compare critical reception with general audience sentiment. The site also offers detailed information, including a "Critics Consensus" summary, individual critic reviews, cast and crew details, trailers, and news. Over the years, Rotten Tomatoes has become an integral part of the movie-watching experience for many, influencing box office performance and shaping public perception of films. While celebrated for its convenience, it has also faced criticism for potentially oversimplifying complex critical opinions into a binary "fresh" or "rotten" judgment. Despite these debates, its role as a significant arbiter of film and TV reception remains undeniable. The company was originally launched by three undergraduate students and has since undergone several ownership changes. It is currently owned by Fandango, a ticketing company, which itself is a subsidiary of NBCUniversal (part of Comcast), with Warner Bros. retaining a minority stake. This ownership structure highlights its deep integration within the broader entertainment industry.

Key Facts

Launch Date: August 12, 1998, as a spare-time project.
Founders: Senh Duong, Patrick Y. Lee, and Stephen Wang.
Core Function: Aggregates film and television reviews from professional critics and verified audiences.
Tomatometer Score: Represents the percentage of positive professional critic reviews.
"Fresh" Threshold: A film is considered "Fresh" if 60% or more of its reviews are positive.
"Rotten" Threshold: A film is considered "Rotten" if less than 60% of its reviews are positive.
Certified Fresh: A special distinction for highly-rated films (75%+ Tomatometer) with a significant number of reviews from top critics.
Audience Score: A separate score reflecting the percentage of verified users who rated a film positively.
Ownership: Currently owned by Fandango Media (a subsidiary of NBCUniversal), with Warner Bros. holding a minority stake.
Influence: A 2018 survey indicated almost a third of U.S. adult moviegoers consult the site before seeing a film.
Criticisms: Often cited for oversimplifying critical nuance and potential for industry manipulation.
TV Zone: A dedicated section for scripted television series, launched in 2013.

Full Explanation

How the Tomatometer and Scores Work

The heart of Rotten Tomatoes is its unique system for aggregating and presenting critical reviews, primarily through the Tomatometer. This score is derived from reviews submitted by professional film and television critics who are certified members of various writing guilds or film critic associations. To become a recognized critic on the platform, reviewers must meet specific criteria, including demonstrating a consistent body of work and receiving a certain level of engagement or "likes" from users on their original reviews. This vetting process aims to ensure that the aggregated scores reflect credible critical opinions. Once a critic is certified, they upload their reviews to the relevant movie or TV show page on the website. Crucially, they must explicitly mark their review as either "fresh" (generally favorable) or "rotten" (generally unfavorable). This manual classification is necessary because many critical essays are qualitative and do not assign a numerical score, making it impossible for an automated system to accurately determine sentiment. The website then tallies all the "fresh" and "rotten" designations to calculate the percentage of positive reviews, which becomes the Tomatometer score. If 60% or more of the counted reviews are positive, the film or show is deemed "Fresh" and is represented by a vibrant red tomato icon. Conversely, if fewer than 60% of the reviews are positive, it is labeled "Rotten," symbolized by a splattered green tomato. Rotten Tomatoes also identifies a subset of highly influential critics as "Top Critics," who typically write for major national newspapers, prominent online publications, or well-established media outlets. Reviews from these Top Critics are included in the overall Tomatometer calculation, but their opinions are also aggregated and displayed separately, offering an additional layer of insight. When a sufficient number of reviews have been collected for a title, the Rotten Tomatoes staff crafts a concise "Critics Consensus" statement. This summary aims to capture the prevailing sentiment and key reasons behind the collective critical opinion, providing users with a quick textual overview alongside the numerical score. Each review excerpt on the site also functions as a hyperlink, allowing interested users to click through and read the critic's full thoughts on the subject.

Certified Fresh and Audience Engagement

Beyond the standard "Fresh" and "Rotten" designations, Rotten Tomatoes offers a prestigious "Certified Fresh" seal. This accolade is reserved for films and TV shows that achieve a consistently high level of critical acclaim. To earn Certified Fresh status, a title must meet two primary criteria: it must maintain a Tomatometer score of 75% or higher, and it must have accumulated a minimum number of reviews from Tomatometer-approved critics. Specifically, wide-release films require at least 80 reviews, while limited-release films need at least 40 reviews, with both categories requiring a minimum of 5 reviews from Top Critics. Once a title achieves this status, it retains the Certified Fresh seal unless its positive critical percentage drops below 70%, ensuring that only consistently well-received works hold this distinction. In addition to professional critical scores, Rotten Tomatoes also features an Audience Score, which reflects the collective opinion of its users. This score is calculated based on the percentage of verified audience members who have rated a film or TV show positively. To ensure authenticity, users must typically prove they have seen the film (e.g., by linking a ticket purchase from Fandango) before their rating contributes to the Audience Score. This distinction between the Tomatometer and the Audience Score is crucial, as it often highlights differences in how critics and general viewers perceive a particular title. A film might be critically acclaimed but less popular with audiences, or vice-versa, providing a more nuanced picture of its reception. The website has also evolved its community features to enhance user engagement. While earlier iterations included user-created discussion groups, these were later streamlined. More recent updates, such as those in 2021, introduced features like an expanded "Score Box" displaying release year, genre, and runtime, and a new "What to Know" section. This section combines the "Critics Consensus" with an "Audience Says" blurb, offering an at-a-glance summary of both critical and audience sentiments. Furthermore, the site includes a dedicated "TV Zone" section, launched in 2013, which applies the same aggregation methodology to scripted television series, reflecting the growing importance of TV in the entertainment landscape.

History

Rotten Tomatoes began as a passion project in August 1998, conceived by Senh Duong, an undergraduate student at the University of California, Berkeley. Duong's initial motivation was to create a centralized online resource where people could easily access a wide variety of film reviews from across the United States. A devoted fan of Jackie Chan, Duong was inspired to build the site after meticulously collecting reviews for Chan's Hong Kong action films as they were released in the U.S. The immediate catalyst for the website's creation was the impending release of *Rush Hour* (1998), Chan's first major Hollywood crossover. Duong coded the entire website in just two weeks, and it went live in August 1998, though *Rush Hour*'s release was delayed until September. The website quickly gained traction, expanding beyond Jackie Chan films to include a broader range of Hollywood movies, with *Your Friends & Neighbors* (1998) being the first non-Chan film featured. Its immediate success was evident, attracting between 600 and 1,000 daily unique visitors within its first week and receiving mentions from prominent internet portals like Netscape and Yahoo!, as well as *USA Today*. Recognizing its potential, Duong teamed up with his former web design partners from Design Reactor, Patrick Y. Lee and Stephen Wang, both fellow Berkeley classmates. Together, they officially launched Rotten Tomatoes as a full-time venture on April 1, 2000. The site's growth led to its first acquisition in June 2004, when IGN Entertainment purchased Rotten Tomatoes for an undisclosed sum. This marked a significant step in its integration into larger media networks. Just over a year later, in September 2005, IGN itself was acquired by News Corp's Fox Interactive Media, further embedding Rotten Tomatoes within a major media conglomerate. However, this ownership was relatively short-lived, as IGN sold the website to Flixster in January 2010. This acquisition aimed to leverage the combined reach of both companies, which boasted 30 million unique visitors per month across their platforms. The following year, in 2011, Warner Bros. acquired Flixster, thereby bringing Rotten Tomatoes under the umbrella of one of Hollywood's biggest studios. During this period of growth and changing ownership, Rotten Tomatoes also experimented with other media formats. In early 2009, Current Television launched *The Rotten Tomatoes Show*, a televised version of the website hosted by Brett Erlich and Ellen Fox, which aired until September 2010. The website itself continued to evolve, introducing a dedicated "TV Zone" section for scripted television series in September 2013, reflecting the increasing popularity of TV content. A major shift occurred in February 2016 when Rotten Tomatoes and its parent site Flixster were sold to Fandango Media, a ticketing company owned by Comcast's NBCUniversal. As part of this deal, Warner Bros. retained a minority stake in the merged entities, including Fandango. Following this acquisition, Fandango and its various websites, including Rotten Tomatoes, relocated to Fox Interactive Media's former headquarters in Beverly Hills, California, in December 2016. Recent years have seen continued development and recognition for Rotten Tomatoes. In July 2017, long-time editor-in-chief Matt Atchity departed, and the site launched a new web series on Facebook, *See It/Skip It*, hosted by Jacqueline Coley and Segun Oduolowu. A significant visual overhaul was introduced in March 2018 at South by Southwest, featuring new designs, icons, and a refreshed logo—the first major redesign in 19 years. The site's cultural impact was further acknowledged in May 2020 when it won the Webby People's Voice Award for Entertainment in the Web category. In February 2021, the Rotten Tomatoes staff announced further design enhancements, including more detailed information in the film's "Score Box" (release year, genre, runtimes), clearer display of rating counts, and the integration of the "Audience Says" blurb into the "What to Know" section, ensuring users have comprehensive insights into both critical and audience reception.

Why It Matters

Rotten Tomatoes matters significantly because it has fundamentally changed how many people discover and decide on films and television shows, and it holds considerable sway within the entertainment industry itself. For moviegoers, it offers an unparalleled convenience: a quick, aggregated snapshot of critical opinion that can be accessed instantly. A 2018 survey highlighted this influence, revealing that nearly a third of adult moviegoers in the United States consulted the site before heading to the cinema. This ease of access and the clear "fresh" or "rotten" indicator often serve as a primary filter for audiences navigating the vast landscape of new releases, making it a powerful tool in consumer decision-making. For the film and television industry, Rotten Tomatoes has become an unavoidable metric. A high Tomatometer score can be a significant marketing asset, often featured prominently in trailers and promotional materials, potentially boosting box office performance and viewership. Conversely, a low score can be a major hurdle, sometimes leading to negative publicity and impacting a film's commercial success. This influence means that studios and distributors pay close attention to their films' scores, and the site has even been criticized for the potential for manipulation, such as studios limiting early screenings to critics they anticipate will be favorable. Beyond its commercial impact, Rotten Tomatoes plays a complex role in the broader ecosystem of film criticism. On one hand, it democratizes access to critical reviews, bringing a diverse range of voices to a wider audience than ever before. It allows users to delve into individual reviews from various publications, fostering a more informed critical discourse. On the other hand, its binary "fresh" versus "rotten" system has sparked ongoing debate among critics and academics. Critics argue that reducing nuanced, complex reviews to a simple positive or negative label can oversimplify critical thought and diminish the art of film criticism itself. The site's authority and methodology are constantly discussed, highlighting its central position in contemporary cultural conversations about movies and TV. Ultimately, Rotten Tomatoes has cemented its place as a household name and an essential part of the modern entertainment experience. Whether viewed as a helpful guide, a powerful industry influencer, or a controversial arbiter of taste, its impact on how films and TV shows are perceived, marketed, and consumed is undeniable. It continues to shape audience expectations and industry strategies, making it a crucial platform in the ever-evolving world of media.