5 Shows Like 'The Great British Baking Show' For Your Reality Competition Needs
The Great British Bake Off debuted on BBC 2 in 2010 as a Kids In Need charity show enticing people to start fundraising bake-offs at home. No one realized at the time that the series, which featured BBC 2 regular Mary Berry, The Supersizers hosts Mel and Sue, and some dude who was into bread would help radically reform the reality show landscape. The series' gentle, upbeat approach and simple format ushered out the cruel Simon Cowells of the last decade in favor of cheering on those who loved to blend eggs, sugar, milk, and flour into gold.
They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery. But in TV, it's merely the inevitable response to anything that can still score 10.4 million viewers and 39.8% share after over a decade on air, a transfer from the BBC to Channel 4 that resulted in nearly a year-long delay between seasons, and multiple casting turnovers in both the judge and host positions. And that's just in the U.K. No one knows how well the series does on Netflix because the streaming service doesn't release officially confirmable numbers. But considering it has no less than four The Great British Baking Show dedicated titles and over a dozen reality shows that have followed in its wake, the answer is probably "Very well, thank you."
And the imitators keep on coming. In the last year, there's been American BBQ Showdown (Southern Cookin' GBBO), Nailed It! (Disaster GBBO), Magic Bake-Off (Disney GBBO), and Making It (Parks & Rec GBBO). And more are on the way, with Baker's Dozen (Literally GBBO, Tent And All, Just With Americans) and Baking Impossible (Not Actually GBBO But Still On Netflix). And that's not even including Discovery+, which debuted in January and has wall to wall baking and cooking shows from Food Network, Cooking Channel, Magnolia Network (Chip and Joanna Gains have their own network), not to mention Disco+'s bizarre ideas, like having Duff Goldman bake with Jim Henson's muppets.
So which of these imitation series should an anglophile check out? Here's a rundown of some of the best Baking Show clones and spinoffs on streaming.
