Will Smith is truly a jack-of-all-trades in the entertainment industry; he’s a highly-revered actor, talented rapper, and visionary film producer. His impressive career can be traced back to the mid-1980s, where he was one half of a talented hip hop duo with DJ Jazzy Jeff. The music sensations released five joint studio albums and created hit songs like the classics “Parents Just Don’t Understand” and “Summertime.” Smith made a transition to acting when he appeared as a fictionalized self-portrayal on the beloved ‘90s sitcom The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. The mega-hit series launched the performer to wider fame and attracted audiences around the world, and served as a stepping stone for a remarkable and diverse film career.

Smith is not afraid to embrace a wide variety of roles, having starred in critically acclaimed dramas like Six Degrees of Separation and The Pursuit of Happyness, as boxing legend Muhammad Ali in the biopic Ali, the romantic comedy Hitch, and of course in a string of memorable action comedies starting back with Bad Boys in 1995. The decorated and renowned performer has earned four Grammy Awards and one recent Golden Globe Award, and has received two Academy Award nominations. His films have grossed over $9.3 billion globally at the box office, proving he is truly a force to be reckoned with. These are the best Will Smith movies, ranked.

9 Six Degrees of Separation

For the 1993 Fred Schepsi dramedy Six Degrees of Separation, Will Smith joined acting greats Stockard Channing, Donald Sutherland, and Ian McKellen, portraying the skillful con artist Paul, who attaches himself to an affluent New York City Couple (Channing and Sutherland). Adapted from John Guare’s Pulitzer Prize-nominated play, the drama centers on the esteemed Ouisa and Flan Kittredge as they battle to shake the compelling yet intrusive con man, an act that proves difficult to achieve. Despite a lukewarm box office response, critics praised the picture and its talented leads, with Channing earning both an Academy Award and Golden Globe nomination. Smith revealed in his memoir that he got so into the role of Paul that his dedication to method acting caused him to briefly fall in love with Channing during filming, causing a severe strain on his new marriage.

8 Hitch

The 2005 romantic comedy Hitch stars Will Smith as date doctor Alex “Hitch” Hitchens, a man who makes a living teaching men how to successfully woo women. When the smooth-talking Hitch falls for the cynical columnist Sara Melas, he discovers that his seemingly foolproof game doesn’t work on the writer. The film co-stars Eva Mendes as Sara and Kevin James as the shy accountant Albert, whom Hitch takes on as a client. Will Smith serves up some major charm and humor for the rom-com flick, which was a hit with audiences and raked in over $350 million. The Herald Sun praised the actor for taking on the role, proclaiming, “Will Smith’s first-ever rom-com. Needless to say, the versatile star was up to the job at the first time of asking.” The romantic comedy genre is often lacking in diversity, and that’s what makes Hitch such a knockout for moviegoers: its leads are an African American and Cuban-American, and is refreshing for audiences to see a powerful interracial couple.

7 Ali

Michael Mann’s 2001 biographical sports drama Ali focuses on the life of boxing legend Muhammad Ali over a ten-year period between 1964 and 1974, highlighting his many triumphs and controversies from his banishment from boxing to his iconic return to fight Joe Frazier in 1971. To prepare for the epic role, Will Smith spent a year learning about the famed athlete’s life, and spent up to seven hours a day training to box, along with studying the Islamic faith. Production favored the use of actual boxing for the film as opposed to ‘Hollywood fighting;’ all the boxers in the film are current or former heavyweight champion-caliber fighters and were instructed to hit Smith as hard as they could so long as they didn’t knock him out. Ali also stars Jamie Foxx and Jon Voight, with the latter and Smith earning Academy Award nominations for their portrayals. For his powerhouse performance, Smith won the NAACP Image Award for Outstanding Actor.

6 I Am Legend

The 2007 post-apocalyptic thriller I Am Legend is loosely based on the Richard Matheson novel of the same name and follows US Army Virologist Robert Neville as he is seemingly the last human left in New York City, and must battle for survival against nocturnal cannibalistic mutants. After years of experiencing development hell, the project found new life in 2006 with Smith signing on for the lead role. The star found the character of Neville to be one of his toughest acting challenges, due to the film’s dark tone and subject, and took the part because he felt it could be like “Gladiator [or] Forrest Gump—these are movies with wonderful, audience-pleasing elements, but also uncompromised artistic value. [This] always felt like it had those possibilities to me.” To prepare for the thriller, Smith visited the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Georgia and met with a person who had been in solitary confinement as well as a prisoner of war. I Am Legend was a critical and commercial hit that further cemented the actor’s status as a box office draw, and is a surprisingly tender and melancholy story about a man (and his beloved dog) dealing with grief and isolation.

Related: These Movie Characters Love Their Pet(s) More Than They Do Any Human

5 The Pursuit of Happyness

Will Smith once again took on the biographical drama genre with 2006’s The Pursuit of Happyness, telling the real-life story of businessman and motivational speaker Chris Gardner as he struggled with homelessness and raising his son in the early 1980s. The tender and deeply moving film features Smith as Gardner, and co-stars his real life son Jayden in his big-screen debut as Gardner’s son Christopher Jr. When Smith nabbed the lead role, Chris Gardner initially thought it was miscast because the actor was best known for big blockbuster pictures; he later claimed his daughter bluntly told him, “If [Smith] can play Muhammad Ali, he can play you!” The movie star garnered widespread acclaim for his endearing portrayal of the struggling Gardner, receiving both an Academy and Golden Globe Award nomination. Rolling Stone raved about the actor’s performance, having commented, “Smith is on the march towards Oscar…[His] role needs gravity, smarts, charm, humor and soul that’s not synthetic. Smith brings it. He’s the real deal.”

4 King Richard

Centering on the life of Richard Williams, father and coach of famed tennis titans Venus and Serena Williams, 2021’s biographical drama King Richard stars Will Smith in the title role and includes the additional talents of Aunjanue Ellis, Tony Goldywn and Jon Bernthal, among others. The film is the third biopic for Smith and is arguably his finest; he won the Golden Globe Award for Best Actor in a Motion Picture Drama and might be on his way to Oscar gold. The actor also produced the drama, and when the pandemic caused Warner Bros. to simultaneously release King Richard on HBO Max and in theaters he personally wrote “checks to the cast” to compensate for his fellow actors' loss of earnings. Smith delivered a scene-stealing performance as the passionate Richard Williams, and Baltimore Magazine declared, “Williams is a larger-than-life character who just so happens to be real, and Smith embodies his underdog, combative, indefatigable spirit to perfection.”

Related: Top 10 Dramatic Movies of 2021

3 Bad Boys

Comedic dream team Will Smith and Martin Lawrence joined forces for the 1995 buddy cop action farce Bad Boys, in Michael Bay’s directorial debut. The hilarious comedy follows two Miami narcotics detectives, Mike Lowrey and Marcus Burnett, as they protect a witness to a murder while investgating a case of stolen heroin from the evidence storage room at their precinct. The energetic tone and off-the-charts chemistry between Smith and Lawrence helped Bad Boys become a commercial success and led to a cult-like following from fans. Bay wasn’t a fan of the script and encouraged the two funnymen to ad-lib and improvise when the cameras were rolling, resulting in plenty of side-splitting scenes. Smith is able to show off both his innate comedic chops and stunt-propelled action skills. Bad Boys spawned two successful sequels: 2003’s Bad Boys II and 2020’s Bad Boys For Life. The latter became the highest-grossing film of the franchise and of 2020, and led to immediate plans for a fourth installment in the series.

2 Independence Day

Centering on a diverse group of people who assemble in the Nevada desert in the aftermath of a worldwide attack by destructive aliens, 1996’s blockbuster sci-fi action flick Independence Day stars Will Smith, Bill Pullman and Jeff Goldblum as mankind’s last hope. Director Roland Emmerich wanted Smith to headline the epic picture after seeing his strong performance in Six Degrees of Separation; Ethan Hawke was originally offered the role but turned it down because he thought the script was terrible. Smith memorably portrays family-man Captain Steven Hiller, a Marine F/A-18 pilot who rises to action to protect his beloved planet from the menacing extraterrestrials. Independence Day went on to become the second highest-grossing film in history at the time and was an unexpected star-making role for Smith, certifying him as a prime box office draw and cementing his movie star status.

1 Men in Black

Barry Sonnefield’s 1997 sci-fi action comedy Men in Black stars Hollywood greats Tommy Lee Jones and Will Smith as Agent K and Agent J, two members of a secret organization called the Men in Black who supervise and hide extraterrestrial lifeforms living on Earth. Smith portrays a newly recruited former NYPD detective who is mentored by the gruff and humorless Agent K, and their charismatic on-screen chemistry and conflicting personalities made the film a knockout hit. Smith was partially cast because Sonnefied’s wife was a massive fan of The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air; when executive producer Stephen Spielberg called him to discuss the project, the actor didn’t believe at first that it was really him. Men in Black was a slam-dunk with moviegoers and critics alike, earning over $500 million at the box-office and receiving praise for its script, visuals, and delightful performances by Jones and Smith. The beloved sci-fi flick led to two lucrative direct sequels: 2002’s Men in Black II and 2012’s Men in Black 3, along with the more recent Men in Black: International, but Smith's absence from that film was palpable, and without the renaissance man's acting, it fizzled out.