The Empress (German: Die Kaiserin) is a German historical drama television series based on the life of Empress Elisabeth of Austria, starring Devrim Lingnau in the title role, and Philip Froissant as Emperor Franz Joseph. It was released on Netflix on 29 September 2022. It was Netflix's second-most watched series worldwide for two weeks and the seventh most popular non-English series of 2022, with over 150 million hours streamed. On 8 November 2022, Netflix renewed it for a second season which premiered on November 22, 2024. Netflix also commissioned a companion novel, The Empress: A Novel, by Gigi Griffis, which was published two days before the series premiered on the streaming service.