HBO’s ‘Euphoria’ Season 3: Cast, Premiere Date, Plot Details

• HBO renewed Sam Levinson’s “Euphoria” for a third season in February 2022.
• The show is still eyeing a return in 2026 and began filming in February 2025.
• Barbie Ferreira and Storm Reid will not reprise their roles as Kat and Gia, respectively.

HBO’s popular drama series “Euphoria” will be back for another installment — but the characters will no longer be in high school.

The show, which is created, written, and directed by Sam Levinson, centers on a 17-year-old drug addict named Rue Bennett (played by two-time Emmy winner Zendaya).

In early February 2022, amid a bonkers and wildly memed second season, HBO announced that “Euphoria” was renewed for a third season.

Here’s everything we know so far about season three. 

The season 3 cast will consist of core characters, with a few shake-ups

On February 14, 2025, HBO announced that Zendaya, Hunter Schafer (Jules Vaughn), Jacob Elordi (Nate Jacobs), Eric Dane (Cal Jacobs), Sydney Sweeney (Cassie Howard), Alexa Demie (Maddy Perez), and Maude Apatow (Lexi Howard) will reprise their roles.

Colman Domingo, who won an Emmy for his performance as Rue’s NA sponsor Ali, will return as a guest star. Martha Kelly, who played a drug lord named Laurie, and Chloe Cherry, who appeared as Faye, have been upped to series regulars.

Season three will feature two new series regulars, played by Adewale Akinnuoye-Agbaje and Toby Wallace, and a slew of guest stars: Rosalía, Marshawn Lynch, Kadeem Hardison, Darrell Britt-Gibson, Priscilla Delgado, James Landry Hébert, and Anna Van Patten.

The same day, Variety reported that Dominic Fike will reprise his role as Elliot. The musician joined the show during season two, with his character driving a wedge between Rue and Jules. He also enabled Rue’s addictions.

HBO reps didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment regarding Fike’s reported involvement.

Don’t expect to see everyone back, though.

Barbie Ferreira (Kat Hernandez) was the first to exit the show in August 2022, months after she reacted to rumors and reports of on-set tension with showrunner Sam Levinson during an interview with Business Insider.

“I’ve seen so many different things and a lot of it is untrue and some of it’s kind of like mundane little things,” she told BI in March 2022.

During an appearance on the podcast “Armchair Expert With Dax Shepard” in April, Ferreira said that her exit was a “mutual decision” because her character’s arc ran its course.

Storm Reid, who starred as Rue’s younger sister Gia, recently told TMZ that she wouldn’t return due to scheduling conflicts. It’s unclear if Nika King will reprise her role as Leslie, Rue and Gia’s mom.

Eric Dane said that his character, Cal Jacobs, will get redemption 

In a 2022 interview with Variety, Dane said that Cal’s story would continue in season three.

Cal was last seen getting arrested after his son Nate called the police on him. 

“There’s gonna be redemption,” Dane said. “I mean, that’s the trajectory he’s on. I can’t imagine Cal’s life from solitary confinement. It’s tough to work Cal into the storyline when he’s behind bars.”

However, Dane’s promise of redemption for his character should be taken with a grain of salt since his comments were made long before the plan for season three was solidified.

There will be a time jump, showing the characters out of high school

Heidi Bivens, a stylist and the costume designer for “Euphoria,” spoke about her work on the series in an April 2023 interview with Vogue and said there was “talk of it being about five years in the future, and that they’re not in high school anymore.”

A time jump would also make sense considering that Zendaya, a producer on “Euphoria,” previously told The Hollywood Reporter that she hoped the next season would show Rue’s life beyond high school. Plus, most of the stars are in their 20s, unlike their teenage characters.  

“I want to see what Rue looks like in her sobriety journey, how chaotic that might look,” Zendaya said. “But also with all the characters, in the sense where they’re trying to figure out what to do with their lives when high school is over and what kind of people they want to be.”

Elordi also expressed skepticism that season three would pick up exactly where fans last left the high school-aged characters. 

“I’m assuming that we’ll have to go forward, otherwise it’s going to seem like a weird bit,” Elordi said during an appearance on “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” in January. 

“I’m going to have a bad back walking down the hallway, you know?” he joked. 

In March 2024, The Hollywood Reporter and Variety reported that season three would include a time jump. HBO and Max chairman and CEO Casey Bloys confirmed this during an interview with Variety in June. 

“One of the issues I think that Sam is thinking about is that he doesn’t want to have it in high school anymore,” Bloys said. “That’s where it was set and what made sense then. So when you take it out of that, there’s a lot of back and forth about where to set it and how far in the future to set it and all that stuff. But I think he’s got a take that he’s excited about, and he’s busy writing.”

Levinson previously said he envisioned season 3 as ‘film noir,’ but this could have changed

In Zendaya’s Elle cover story in August 2023, Levinson said that season three will “explore what it means to be an individual with principles in a corrupt world.”

It’s important to note, however, that Levinson productions famously change direction on a dime, even during filming. In a press junket interview for season two, Elordi told Business Insider that the scripts for those episodes were “changing pretty regularly for the longest time.” 

The direction for season three is still up in the air.

Variety reported in March 2024 that HBO wasn’t pleased with Levinson’s revised scripts that he submitted in late 2023 and early 2024. Those new scripts reportedly had Rue working as a private detective, an idea that HBO shut down.

Variety said that Zendaya pitched her character as a sober twentysomething surrogate mom. Insiders told Variety that her idea was also turned down because it didn’t feel aligned with the show’s tone. The publication added that even though Zendaya is an executive producer, “she doesn’t have veto power over the scripts.”

Per a report published by THR in July 2024, Zendaya was opposed to Levinson’s private detective pitch. Sources told the publication that Zendaya and Levinson’s once-close working relationship has become strained and tense amid the show’s delays.

‘Euphoria’ won’t return until 2026, and it’ll probably be the final season 

The show’s production was delayed by the 2023 Hollywood writers’ and actors’ strikes.

In a January 2024 interview with TheWrap, Bloys said that Levinson was “in the thick” of writing season three. 

Two months later, Deadline reported that season three was delayed again — this time due to Levinson’s scripts not being completed. Deadline said that filming was supposed to start “within the next couple of months.” With the indefinite delay, the stars were allowed to take on other jobs. 

In July, HBO confirmed that production on season three would begin in January 2025. 

During a 2025 slate preview event in November, Bloys said that season three will be comprised of eight episodes.

At a tech and media conference in December 2024, Warner Bros. Discovery global streaming chief JB Perrette said “Euphoria” was eyeing a 2026 return.

Filming for season three finally began in February 2025, and HBO shared a first-look image of Zendaya as Rue. Shortly after, Orsi told Deadline that nothing’s confirmed yet regarding the show’s future beyond season three, “but it’s been discussed that this is the end.”

“I think you will be very satisfied with this season, and how we bring each of the characters’ whole narrative,” Orsi said.