"One adventure will change two worlds."
— Tagline for The First Story
How to Train Your Dragon is a franchise that began as a series of twelve children's books, written by British author Cressida Cowell.
It was then given a film adaption by DreamWorks Animation, with Chris Sanders and Dean DeBlois at the director's helm. It has gone onto include two sequels (both directed by just DeBlois), several television cartoons, several Licensed Games and Graphic Novels, amongst other derivatives set in the world of the films.
Works in this franchise:
- How to Train Your Dragon - The series of books written by Cressida Cowell that the franchise is (loosely) based on.
Feature films
- How to Train Your Dragon (2010)
- How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014)
- How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (2019)
- How To Train Your Dragon (2025) - Live action remake of the animated film.
Short films
- The Legend of the Boneknapper Dragon (2010) - Gobber, Hiccup and the other Viking teens head out to hunt down a supposed renegade dragon called the Boneknapper, a dragon that wears bones as armor.
- Book of Dragons (2011)
- Gift of the Night Fury (2011)
- Dawn of the Dragon Racers (2014)
- How to Train Your Dragon: Homecoming (2019) - A Christmas Special released as a midquel between the trilogy's main story and its Distant Epilogue.
- How to Train Your Dragon: Snoggletog Log (2019) - A yule log video that aired alongside How To Train Your Dragon: Homecoming on Hulu.
Comic Books
- Titan Comics
- Dragons Riders Of Berk (2014-2015)
- Dragon Down
- Dangers of the Deep
- The Ice Castle
- The Stowaway
- The Legend of Ragnarok
- Underworld
- Dragons Defenders Of Berk (2016)
- The Endless Night
- Snowmageddon
- Dragons Riders Of Berk (2014-2015)
- Joe Books, Inc.
- How to Train Your Dragon Cinestory Comic
- Dark Horse
- How To Train Your Dragon Burning Midnight (2016)
- How To Train Your Dragon: The Serpent's Heir (2017) - After the events of the second movie, the riders come to the aid of an island suffering mysterious earth tremors.
- How To Train Your Dragon Dragonvine (2018)
Literature
- How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World: Meet the New Dragons (2019)
Tabletop games
- How to Train Your Dragon: Dragon Training 101 Board Game (2010)
- How to Train Your Dragon 2: Sheep Launcher Game (2014)
- How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World – Battle Royale Game (2019)
- How to Train Your Dragon: The Hidden World (2019)
Television series
- Dragons: Riders of Berk (2012-2013) - The first season of DreamWorks' Dragons, a midquel series between the first and second films.
- Dragons: Defenders of Berk (2013-2014)
- Dragons: Race to the Edge (2015-2018)
- Dragons: Rescue Riders (2019-2022) - A preschool-aimed Spin-Off series.
- Dragons: The Nine Realms (2021-2023) - A Distant Sequel to not only DreamWorks' Dragons, but the film trilogy as well.
Theatre
- How to Train Your Dragon Arena Spectacular/How to Train Your Dragon Live Spectacular (2012)
- How to Train Your Dragon ON ICE (2014)
Theme Parks
- Untrainable (Universal Studios Beijing, 2021)
- How to Train Your Dragon: Isle of Berk (Themed land at Universal Epic Universe, 2025)
Video games
- How to Train Your Dragon (2010)
- Flight of the Night Fury (2010)
- Dragon Training Legends (2011)
- DreamWorks Super Star Kartz (2011)
- Tap Dragon Drop (2012)
- DreamWorks Dragons: Wild Skies (2012)
- School of Dragons (2013)
- Outcast Attack (2013)
- How to Train Your Dragon (2014)
- Dragons Hero Portal (2014)
- Dragons: Rise of Berk (2014)
- Dragon Racers: The Dragon Berry Dash (2014)
- DreamWorks Dragons: Online Card Game (2015)
- Dragons: Titan Uprising (2019)
- DreamWorks Dragons: Dawn of New Riders (2019)
- Dragon Pets (2019)
- Funko Pop! Blitz (2020) note
- Dragons: Legend of the Nine Realms (2022)
- DreamWorks All-Star Kart Racing (2023)
Tropes Include:
- Central Theme:
- First Movie: Empathy and understanding for others over hate and judgement.
- Second Movie: Assuming responsibility and leadership.
- Third Movie: The Power of Love and the importance of embracing change.
- The Franchise Overall: The cycle of violence and what it takes to truly end it.
- Earth Drift: Zig-Zagged. While the films have always been rather vague about how close their world is to our own, there were a few references to the real world in the beginning, such as when Hiccup brought Toothless a basket full of fish and directly called some of them Icelandic Cod. Later films and animated series would pull back on direct reference to real life and seem to take the approach that the HTTYD world is its own setting only passingly similar to reality, only for The Nine Realms to come along and be set in the present day set 1,300 after Hiccup's time, making this subverted in the end.
- Giant Flyer: The majority of the different dragon species are bigger than humans and have large wingspans to match. The Red Death from the first film takes the cake as the second largest species of dragon in the franchise and the largest that is capable of flying. note
- The Kids Are American: Every single member of the parents' generation speaks with a Scottish accent. Every single member of Hiccup's speaks with an American one.
Word of God is that this was intentional to make the younger generation more relatable to the Western (read: American) audience and to underscore the divide between the traditionalist adults and the modern, progressive youth. - Pet-sonal Security: Toothless and Hiccup share the strongest bond in the franchise, and there's nothing the dragon won't do to protect his best friend.