The long-running procedural 'Criminal Minds: Evolution' will end with its upcoming 20th season on Paramount+, as first reported by The Hollywood Reporter and confirmed by Variety on October 30, 2026. The finale season does not yet have a premiere date but will air in 2027.

Showrunner and executive producer Erica Messer said in a statement, "It's hard to put into words what 'Criminal Minds' has meant to all of us who have been fortunate enough to be part of this extraordinary journey, first on CBS for 15 seasons and then on Paramount+ for five."

The season will be the fifth since the show adopted the Evolution subtitle upon moving to streaming.

The surprise is not just that a 20-season series is ending, but how close the franchise came to never returning at all.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, CBS ended the original run after season 15 in 2020, and only a year later Paramount+ revived the series with the Evolution tag, extending a run that now spans two decades.

Messer credited "the incredible fans around the world whose unwavering loyalty has kept 'Criminal Minds' going for two decades," and said the team is "looking forward to sharing season 20 with everyone, and celebrating the legacy of this special show we've all built together."

The franchise transformed in its streaming era. The Hollywood Reporter notes that since moving to Paramount+, 'Criminal Minds' has become more serialized, with story arcs spanning full seasons of 10 episodes each — a sharp contrast to the 22-plus-episode seasons of most of the CBS run.

The original series ran for more than 300 episodes from 2005 to 2020 and spawned two shorter-lived spinoffs, the one-season 'Criminal Minds: Suspect Behavior' and the two-season 'Criminal Minds: Beyond Borders'.

The farewell season will be led by franchise mainstays. According to Variety, 'Evolution' stars Joe Mantegna, A.J.

Cook, Kirsten Vangsness, Aisha Tyler and RJ Hatanaka, with Adam Rodriguez and Paget Brewster also returning. E!

News adds that Cook, Vangsness, Brewster, Mantegna, Tyler and Rodriguez were the notable holdovers who stayed on when the show adopted its Evolution subtitle, while Hatanaka joined in the first Paramount+ season — the franchise's 16th overall.

The original 2005 lineup featured Mandy Patinkin, Thomas Gibson, Shemar Moore, Matthew Gray Gubler, A.J. Cook, Kirsten Vangsness and Lola Glaudini as FBI Behavioral Analysis Unit profilers.

The end-date news lands just months after a dramatic season 19 finale. E!

News reports that season 19, which aired between May and July earlier this year per Variety, ended with the exit of Zach Gilford, whose villain-turned-hero Elias Voit was sent to a maximum security prison after taking the fall for crimes committed by his daughter's kidnapper.

"It was hard to say goodbye," Gilford told Us Weekly in a July interview, adding that on this show he did know it was the end. That finality now extends to the entire series.

Season 20 will arrive in 2027 with no premiere date yet announced, giving the show a final season to celebrate what Variety describes as the FBI's Behavioral Analysis Unit team "tasked with analyzing and capturing the country's most dangerous criminals."

The series is produced by 20th Television and CBS Studios, with Messer executive producing alongside Breen Frazier, Chris Barbour, Glenn Kershaw, Stacey Hardt and Mark Gordon.

For devoted viewers, the question now is whether the franchise's prolific revival streak — from cancellation to Evolution — yields another chapter someday, or whether the profilers' wheels-up calls truly end in 2027.