History

Fandango headquarters in Beverly Hills (home to Rotten Tomatoes)

Rotten Tomatoes was launched on August 12, 1998, as a spare-time project by Senh Duong.[11] His
objective in creating Rotten Tomatoes was "to create a site where people can get access to reviews
from a variety of critics in the U.S".[12] As a fan of Jackie Chan, Duong was inspired to create the
website after collecting all the reviews of Chan's Hong Kong action movies as they were being
released in the United States. The catalyst for the creation of the website was Rush Hour (1998),
Chan's first major Hollywood crossover, which was originally planned to release in August 1998.
Duong coded the website in two weeks and the site went live the same month, but the release of
Rush Hour was delayed until September 1998. Besides Jackie Chan films, he began including other
films on Rotten Tomatoes, extending it beyond Chan's fandom.[13][14] The first non-Chan
Hollywood movie whose reviews were featured on Rotten Tomatoes was Your Friends &
Neighbors (1998). The website was an immediate success, receiving mentions by Netscape, Yahoo!,
and USA Today within the first week of its launch; it attracted "600–1,000 daily unique visitors" as a
result.[citation needed]
Duong teamed up with University of California, Berkeley classmates Patrick Y. Lee and Stephen
Wang, his former partners at the Berkeley, California-based web design firm Design Reactor, to
pursue Rotten Tomatoes on a full-time basis. They officially launched it on April 1, 2000.[15]
In June 2004, IGN Entertainment acquired Rotten Tomatoes for an undisclosed sum.[16] In
September 2005, IGN was bought by News Corp's Fox Interactive Media.[17] In January 2010,
IGN sold the website to Flixster.[18] The combined reach of both companies is 30 million unique
visitors a month across all different platforms, according to the companies.[19] In 2011, Warner
Bros. acquired Rotten Tomatoes.[20]
In early 2009, Current Television launched The Rotten Tomatoes Show, a televised version of the
web review site. It was hosted by Brett Erlich and Ellen Fox and written by Mark Ganek. The show
aired Thursdays at 10:30 EST[21] until September 16, 2010. It returned as a much shorter segment
of InfoMania, a satirical news show that ended in 2011.[citation needed]
By late 2009, the website was designed to enable Rotten Tomatoes users to create and join groups to
discuss various aspects of film. One group, "The Golden Oyster Awards", accepted votes of
members for various awards, spoofing the better-known Academy Awards or Golden Globes. When
Flixster bought the company, they disbanded the groups.[22][citation needed]
As of February 2011, new community features have been added and others removed. For example,
users can no longer sort films by Fresh Ratings from Rotten Ratings, and vice versa.[citation
needed]
On September 17, 2013, a section devoted to scripted television series, called TV Zone, was created
as a subsection of the website.[23]
In February 2016, Rotten Tomatoes and its parent site Flixster were sold to Comcast's Fandango
Media. Warner Bros retained a minority stake in the merged entities, including Fandango.[3]
In December 2016, Fandango and all its various websites moved to Fox Interactive Media's former
headquarters in Beverly Hills, California.[24]
In July 2017, the website's editor-in-chief since 2007, Matt Atchity, left to join The Young Turks
YouTube channel.[25] On November 1, 2017, the site launched a new web series on Facebook, See
It/Skip It, hosted by Jacqueline Coley and Segun Oduolowu.[26]
In March 2018, the site announced its new design, icons and logo for the first time in 19 years at
South by Southwest.[27]
In February 2021, the Rotten Tomatoes staff made an entry on their Product Blog, announcing
several design changes to the site:[28] Each film's 'Score Box' at the top of the page would now also
include its release year, genre, and runtimes, with an MPAA rating to be soon added; the number of
ratings would be shown in groupings – from 50+ up to 250,000+ ratings, for easier visualization.
Links to critics and viewers are included underneath the ratings.[28] By clicking on either the
Tomatometer Score or the Audience Score, the users can access "Score Details" information, such
as the number of Fresh and Rotten reviews, average rating, and Top Critics’ score. The team also
added a new "What to Know" section for each film entry page, which could combine the "Critics
Consensus" blurb with a new "Audience Says" blurb, so users can see an at-a-glance summary of
the sentiments of both certified critics and verified audience members.[28]

Traffic
As of April 11, 2022, Rotten Tomatoes is a top 1000 site, being the 593rd highest-ranked website in
the world, and #254 in the United States, according to website ranker Alexa.[29]

Features
Critic aggregate score
Rotten Tomatoes staff first collect online reviews from writers who are certified members of various
writing guilds or film critic-associations. To be accepted as a critic on the website, a critic's original
reviews must garner a specific number of "likes" from users. Those classified as "Top Critics"
generally write for major newspapers. The critics upload their reviews to the movie page on the
website, and need to mark their review "fresh" if it's generally favorable or "rotten" otherwise. It is
necessary for the critic to do so as some reviews are qualitative and do not grant a numeric score,
making it impossible for the system to be automatic.[citation needed]
The website keeps track of all the reviews counted for each film and calculates the percentage of
positive reviews. Major recently released films can attract more than 400 reviews. If the positive
reviews make up 60% or more, the film is considered "fresh". If the positive reviews are less than
60%, the film is considered "rotten". An average score on a 0 to 10 scale is also calculated. With
each review, a short excerpt of the review is quoted that also serves a hyperlink to the complete
review essay for anyone interested to read the critic's full thoughts on the subject.
"Top Critics", such as Roger Ebert, Desson Thomson, Stephen Hunter, Owen Gleiberman, Lisa
Schwarzbaum, Peter Travers and Michael Phillips are identified in a sub-listing that calculates their
reviews separately. Their opinions are also included in the general rating. When there are sufficient
reviews, the staff creates and posts a consensus statement to express the general reasons for the
collective opinion of the film.[citation needed]
This rating is indicated by an equivalent icon at the film listing, to give the reader a one-glance look
at the general critical opinion about the work. The "Certified Fresh" seal is reserved for movies that
satisfy two criteria: a "Tomatometer" of 75% or better and at least 80 reviews (40 for limited release
movies) from "Tomatometer" critics (including 5 Top Critics). Films earning this status will keep it
unless the positive critical percentage drops below 70%.[30] Films with 100% positive ratings but
fewer than required reviews may not receive the "Certified Fresh" seal.

Tomatometer Rankings
Icon Score Description
Certified Fresh: Wide-release films with a score of 75% or higher that are reviewed
by at least 80 critics, of whom 5 are "Top Critics", are given this seal. The "Certified
100– Fresh" seal remains until the score drops below 70%.[30] Films with limited releases
75% require only 40 reviews (including 5 from "Top Critics") to qualify for this seal. For
TV shows, only individual seasons are eligible for consideration, and each must have
at least 20 critic reviews.[30]
100– Fresh: Films or TV shows with a score of 60% or higher that do not meet the
60% requirements for the "Certified Fresh" seal.
59–
Rotten: Films or TV shows with a score of 59% or lower receive this seal.
0%
When a film or TV show reaches the requirements for the "Certified Fresh", it is not automatically
granted the seal, but is instead flagged for the staff's consideration. Once the team assesses the
reviews and response to the film or TV show, and decide that it is unlikely that the score will fall
below the minimum requirements in the future, they will then mark it as "Certified Fresh".[31]