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Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 lands on Netflix on October 20, with all 10 episodes dropping at once. The first season came out in 2022, won Anime of the Year at the Crunchyroll Anime Awards, and sent a lot of people back to Cyberpunk 2077, the video game it is based on. The new buzz comes mostly from older teens and adult fans, and that is how kids far below the show’s age rating end up hearing about it.
My kids are 11 and 13. My son uses a Kids profile on Netflix, so the show never shows up for him. My 13-year-old has a teen profile with a higher maturity ceiling, but I still have Cyberpunk blocked on hers. I wrote that line in our streaming services guide a while back, and it is the short version of this whole page.
I have not watched Edgerunners myself. The age rating below comes from the official ratings, Common Sense Media, the IMDb parents guide, and what Netflix and CD Projekt Red have said about the new season, and every one of those sources lands in the same place.
The Short Answer
Skip it for kids. Cyberpunk: Edgerunners is rated TV-MA on Netflix, and Common Sense Media puts it at 17+ with a one-line summary that says it plainly: “Well-produced, violent video game adaptation isn’t for kids.” It gets the same Skip verdict we give Chainsaw Man and Attack on Titan on our anime age ratings page.
Season 2 has no official rating yet as of early October, and nothing released so far suggests it will come in lower. For a 17-year-old, I would call it the parent’s decision, made after reading the next section.
If you have a teenager who wants a story with real weight and real consequences, point them at Fullmetal Alchemist. The Brotherhood anime is 14+ in our Finder, and the complete manga box set tells the whole story.
What Is Actually in It
Season 1 is only 10 episodes, with no mild early stretch to ease into. Here is what is in it by category, kept to what kind of content and how often.
Violence and gore
This is the heaviest part. Common Sense Media rates the violence at its top level and describes “lots of gritty, bloody fantasy violence ranging from massive shootings to brutal beatings.” The IMDb parents guide calls the violence and gore severe. The whole story runs on cybernetic implants, so bodies get torn apart along with the machinery, throughout the series. Main characters die on screen, and the ending is a hard one.
Sex and nudity
Parents get caught off guard here, because it starts in episode 1. Common Sense Media describes “brief scenes of sex acts being performed” with full frontal nudity and rates sex and nudity at its top level as well. Anyone who sees the trailer and files it under action cartoon would be surprised before the first episode is over.
Drugs, suicide, and language
Drug use shows up on screen, alongside frequent smoking and drinking. The IMDb parents guide also lists suicide among the show’s content. Strong language is constant.
Common Sense Media puts Edgerunners at “a lot” for violence, sex, language, and substances alike.
What to Watch Instead
The pull of Edgerunners is mostly style, a neon city with big action and a soundtrack people keep on repeat. Here is what I would hand a kid instead, by the ages in our Anime Finder.
For 12 and 13, My Hero Academia is where I would start. It is 12+ in our Finder, and the hero starts out powerless and earns everything. We once watched it as a family during a power outage, huddled around a laptop.
10 and up: Mob Psycho 100. An overpowered psychic kid just wants to be normal, the animation gets wild, and the message is that being strongest does not make you the best person.
12 and up: Delicious in Dungeon and Komi Can’t Communicate. Both are on Netflix, so they sit in the same app your kid is already scrolling. My kids were grossed out and fascinated by Delicious in Dungeon in equal measure.
14 and up: Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood and Cowboy Bebop. Bebop is the closest in feel to Edgerunners, with bounty hunters, guns, and a soundtrack that carries the whole show. It was my gateway anime in college.
16 and up, if it is cyberpunk they want: Akira and Ghost in the Shell. Both are 16+ in our Finder, and they are the films the whole genre grew out of. They still carry warnings of their own, graphic violence and body horror in Akira, and violence plus non-sexual nudity in a cyborg context in Ghost in the Shell.
For longer lists by age, see our guides to wholesome anime for teens and shonen anime for kids.
Why Kids Hear About It
Most 11-year-olds will not go looking for an adult anime on their own. Edgerunners reaches them from a few directions at once.
The biggest one is the game. Cyberpunk 2077 is rated M (Mature 17+) by the ESRB and 18 by PEGI, and the ESRB descriptors include Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Nudity, Strong Sexual Content, and Use of Drugs and Alcohol. It is on PC, PlayStation, Xbox, and the Nintendo Switch 2, and it turns up constantly in gameplay videos, so a kid who games knows the name. The anime gave the game a second wind in 2022 and helped push its sales past 20 million copies.
The music travels on its own, too. “I Really Want to Stay at Your House,” a song written for the game, went viral through the show in 2022 and charted in the UK. Fan edits set to it are still all over TikTok and YouTube, cut from the show itself.
And then there is Netflix. The first season made the Top 10 in its first week, and a sequel dropping all at once will sit on the home screen, right where a younger sibling sees it.
How to Block It on Netflix
What to do depends on the profile.
Kids profile. A Kids profile already filters out TV-MA shows, so Edgerunners never appears. That is my son’s setup. One catch: Netflix only lets you change a Kids profile’s settings in a web browser, not in the app.
Teen profile. Do two things. First, set the profile’s maturity rating below TV-MA (TV-14 is the usual ceiling for a teenager in the US), which catches every TV-MA title automatically, the new season included. Second, block the show by name as a backup. On my daughter’s profile, the block by name is the part I rely on.
In the app:
- Tap My Netflix, tap your profile name, then Manage Profiles.
- Choose your kid’s profile and tap Viewing Restrictions.
- Tap Maturity Rating or Block Titles. Netflix asks for your account password.
- For Block Titles, type the show’s name and tap it to add it to the list.
In a browser, it is Account, Profiles, then Adjust parental controls. Pick the profile, confirm it is you, type the show’s name under Title Restrictions, and select Save.
Then check again on October 20. The new season may show up under the same title or as a separate listing called Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2, and a block only covers the title you picked. If the change does not appear on the TV right away, switch to another profile and back.
Your own profile. Put a Profile Lock on it, a 4-digit PIN, so nobody can switch into it from the couch. Then require a PIN to add new profiles, or a determined 13-year-old can just make a fresh one with no limits.
Edgerunners is a Netflix exclusive, so it is not on Crunchyroll or Hulu. It leaks out through YouTube and TikTok clips and through the game. The Switch is the console most likely to be in a kid’s room, and the free Nintendo Switch Parental Controls app (it covers the Switch 2 as well) can restrict games by ESRB rating, which keeps an M-rated game like Cyberpunk 2077 from running. PlayStation and Xbox family settings do the same.
About Season 2
Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2 is a standalone story with a new cast, set in the same city, and the first season’s main characters do not come back. Netflix describes it as a story of redemption and revenge “in a city that thrives on violence.”
As of early October, Netflix has not posted a maturity rating for it. The trailers lean on the same violence and body horror as the first season, so I expect TV-MA, and I will update this page if the official rating says something different.
A kid who never saw season 1 gets a clean place to start, and a brand-new release gets pushed hard on the home screen, so if your setup depends on a block by name, recheck it on October 20.
What’s Next
Our parent’s guide to anime streaming services compares the parental controls on every service that carries anime.
For shows that are right for a teenager, start with wholesome anime for teens. For younger kids who want action, shonen anime for kids sorts the genre by age from 10+ up.
Every show we have rated, including the other Skip titles, is on our anime age ratings page, and the Anime Finder filters them by age and streaming service. Everything else anime and manga lives on the anime and manga hub.
About These Recommendations
I’m George. I read to my kids for 10+ years before they started reading on their own. My wife’s a therapist who helped pick books that actually matter for development. Everything on this site got tested on our family first.
FAQ
No. It is rated TV-MA on Netflix, and Common Sense Media rates it 17+. It has graphic gore throughout, sex scenes with full frontal nudity starting in episode 1, drug use, and constant strong language. We give it the same Skip verdict as Chainsaw Man and Attack on Titan.
We would say no. The sex scenes and the gore are well past what we recommend at 14, and Common Sense Media sets its age at 17. Fullmetal Alchemist: Brotherhood or Cowboy Bebop (both 14+ in our Anime Finder) are better picks. From 17, it is the parent’s call.
TV-MA in the US, the rating for mature audiences only. Common Sense Media puts it at 17+. It is based on Cyberpunk 2077, a video game the ESRB rates M (Mature 17+) and PEGI rates 18.
As of early October 2026, Netflix has not posted an official rating for Cyberpunk: Edgerunners 2. It arrives on October 20, 2026, with all 10 episodes at once. It is a standalone story with a new cast, and the trailers show the same kind of violence, so expect the same TV-MA as the first season.
Yes. Sex scenes with full frontal nudity start in episode 1, and Common Sense Media rates the show’s sex and nudity at its highest level.
In Manage Profiles, choose your kid’s profile, go to Viewing Restrictions, and use Block Titles to add Cyberpunk: Edgerunners by name. A maturity rating of TV-14 or lower also blocks it, and a Kids profile hides it already. Recheck on October 20 in case the new season is listed separately.