20 Most Popular British Detective Shows: ‘Broadchurch’ to ‘Line of Duty’

Olivia Colman and David Tennant play detectives looking into the murder of a young boy in this ITV series. Creator Chris Chibnall later adapted Broadchurch for American television in the Fox series Gracepoint, with Tennant back as the co-headliner.

With Ashley Jensen in the title role, this comedic Acorn TV mystery series has Agatha Raisin trading in a career in public relations for a new job investigating murders in the Cotswolds village of Carsely.

Inspired by the short stories of G.K. Chesterton, this BBC One comedy-drama features Mark Williams as a disheveled Roman Catholic priest with a gift for crime-solving. The series spawned a spinoff, the BritBox drama Sister Boniface Mysteries.

BBC One aired five seasons of this series — starring Idris Elba as the titular detective chief inspector mired in the darkness of the crimes he investigates — and a Netflix film continuation will start streaming on March 10.

Based on the stories of detective novelist Michael Dibdin, this BBC One series aired just three TV movies before getting the axe. In the plot line, Rufus Sewell played a police detective navigating politics and bureaucracy in his work in Rome.

Benedict Cumberbatch became a household name (and won an Emmy) with his modern-day take on the immortal Sherlock Holmes in this BBC series, with Martin Freeman playing a war-veteran version of Dr. John Watson.

Sarah Lancashire won a BAFTA Television Award for her role in this BBC One series, in which she plays a West Yorkshire police sergeant recovering from the suicide of her daughter and raising her daughter’s young son.

Metropolitan Police Service DI John River (Stellan Skarsgård) sees dead people, and not just because he works on murder cases: In this six-episode BBC One series, River is haunted by visions of a slain colleague.

This ITV series had DI Joseph Chandler (Rupert Penry-Jones) and his colleagues delving into murders copying historical crimes, with the first season serving as a modern-day analog to the story of Jack the Ripper.

In this ITV series, in 1950s England, a village’s detective inspector (played by Robson Green) gets an unlikely partner in his crime-solving: an Anglican vicar (played first by James Norton and now Tom Brittney).

Originally based on mystery novels by Ann Cleeves, this BBC series starred Douglas Henshall as DI Jimmy Pérez for its first seven seasons, following the character and his team as they investigate crimes in the close-knit community of the titular islands.

A co-production between BBC One and Starz, this two-season drama starred Tchéky Karyo as French detective Julien Baptiste, with James Nesbitt, Frances O’Connor, David Morrissey, and Keeley Hawes playing the parents of missing children.

Broadcast on RTÉ One in Ireland and BBC Two in the U.K., The Fall starred Jamie Dorman as a serial killer and Gillian Anderson as the police superintendent on his tail. (And Fiona Apple named her album Fetch the Bolt Cutters after a quote from the show.)

Airing since 1997, ITV’s Midsomer Murders starred John Nettles as Detective Chief Inspector Tom Barnaby until he was succeeded by Neil Dudgeon as DCI John Barnaby, Tom’s cousin.

Another ITV series with murder mysteries and picturesque backdrops, this one stars two-time Oscar nominee Brenda Blethyn as DCI Vera Stanhope, a brilliant but caustic crime-solver investigating murders in the scenic area of Northumberland.

A prequel to Inspector Morse, this ITV series follows a young Endeavour Morse (Shaun Evans) in his early years working as a detective with the Oxford City Police. The series’ upcoming ninth season will be its last.

Idris Elba, Benedict Cumberbatch, Daisy Ridley, and Nicholas Hoult have all guest-starred on this series about forensic pathologists, which has reached TV audiences in 235 territories, according to the BBC.

Ben Miller, Kris Marshall, Ardal O’Hanlon, and Ralf Little have taken turns as the lead of this BBC One series. Set on the fictional Caribbean island of Saint Marie, Death in Paradise is filmed in Guadeloupe.

After her time on Spooks but before she was on the case in Annika, Nicola Walker starred in this crime drama. She and costar Sanjeev Bhaskar portrayed London detectives endeavoring to solve cold cases.

Martin Compston, Vicky McClure, and Adrian Dunbar starred in this drama about the anti-corruption unit of the Central Police. After becoming the most popular drama on BBC Two, the show switched over to BBC One.