Law & Order: Special Victims Unit (often shortened to Law & Order: SVU or SVU) is an American police procedural crime drama television series created by Dick Wolf for NBC. The first spin-off of Law & Order, expanding it into the Law & Order franchise, it originally starred Christopher Meloni as Detective Elliot Stabler (until Meloni left the series in 2011 after 12 seasons, moving to CBS Studios, formerly known as CBS Television Studios) and Mariska Hargitay as Detective (now promoted to Captain) Olivia Benson remaining the longest starring character in the series. Law & Order: Special Victims Unit follows the detectives of the Special Victims Unit as they investigate and prosecute sex-based crimes. Some of the episodes are loosely based on real crimes that have received media attention.
The series, produced by Wolf Entertainment and Universal Television, premiered on September 20, 1999. The series has received 108 award nominations, winning 59 awards. Hargitay was the first and only regular cast member on any Law & Order series to win an Emmy Award when she won the Primetime Emmy Award for Outstanding Lead Actress in a Drama Series in 2006.
After the premiere of its 21st season in September 2019, the series became the longest-running primetime live-action series on American television. Since the end of the original run of the main Law & Order series in 2010, SVU is the only live-action primetime series having debuted in the 1990s to remain in continuous production. The 23rd season premiered on September 23, 2021, during which the show aired its milestone 500th episode. As of May 14, 2026, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit has aired 594 original episodes, well surpassing the episode count of the original Law & Order series. In terms of all-time episode count for an American primetime scripted series, SVU now ranks third behind The Simpsons (with 808 episodes) and Gunsmoke (with 635 episodes). The 25th season premiered on January 18, 2024, and on March 21, 2024, NBC announced that it had renewed the series for its 26th season, which premiered on October 3, 2024. The 27th season premiered on September 25, 2025. In April 2026, the series was renewed for a 28th season, which will premiere on October 8 of the same year.
The two longest-running regular characters in primetime live-action scripted American television history both achieved that record on SVU. Richard Belzer's John Munch character began his 21st consecutive season as a main character, first on Homicide: Life on the Street and then on SVU, in the show's 14th season in fall 2012, breaking the 20-season record held by two cast members of Gunsmoke and remaining through SVU'''s 15th season before departing as a regular. In fall 2021, Mariska Hargitay began her 23rd season as Olivia Benson, in turn breaking Belzer's record.
Premise
Based out of the New York City Police Department's 16th precinct in Manhattan, Law & Order: Special Victims Unit delves into the dark side of the New York underworld as the detectives of a new elite squad, the Special Victims Unit (SVU for short), investigate and prosecute various sexually oriented crimes, including rape, child sexual abuse, human trafficking, and domestic violence. They also investigate the abuses of children, the disabled and elderly victims of non-sexual crimes who require specialist handling, all while trying to balance the effects of the investigation on their own lives as they try not to let the dark side of these crimes affect them.
Its stories also touch on the political and societal issues associated with gender identity, sexual preferences, and equality rights. While the victim is often murdered, this is not always the case, and victims frequently play prominent roles in episodes. The unit also works with the Manhattan District Attorney's office as they prosecute cases and seek justice for SVU's victims and survivors with precision and a passion to win and bring closure to the intense investigations. The series often uses stories that are "ripped from the headlines" or based on real crimes. Such episodes take a real crime and fictionalize it by changing some details.
Episodes
Cast and characters
Production Development
The idea for Law & Order: Special Victims Unit originated with the 1986 "preppie murder" case of Robert Chambers, who strangled and killed a woman he dated, Jennifer Levin, during what he claimed was consensual "rough sex" in Manhattan's Central Park. The crime inspired Dick Wolf to write the story for the season one episode of Law & Order titled "Kiss the Girls and Make Them Die". After writing the episode, Wolf wanted to go deeper into the psychology of crimes to examine the role of human sexuality.Green and Dawn (2009), p. 2
The original title of the show was Sex Crimes. Initially, there was concern among the producers that, should Sex Crimes fail, identifying the new show with the Law & Order franchise could affect the original show. Additionally, Ted Kotcheff wanted to create a new series that was not dependent upon the original series for success. Wolf felt, however, that it was important and commercially desirable to have "Law & Order" in the title, and he initially proposed the title of the show be Law & Order: Sex Crimes. Barry Diller, then head of Studios USA, was concerned about the title, however, and it was changed to Law & Order: Special Victims Unit to reflect the actual unit of the New York City Police Department (NYPD) that handles sexually based offenses.Green and Dawn (2009), pp. 10–11
Executive producer Neal Baer left Law & Order: SVU as showrunner at the end of season twelve, after eleven years (seasons 2–12) on the show, in order to sign a three-year deal with CBS Television Studios. Baer was replaced by former Law & Order: Criminal Intent showrunner Warren Leight. In March 2015, it was announced that Warren Leight signed a three-year deal with Sony Pictures Television, that will allow him to work on SVU one more season, its seventeenth. It was announced on March 10, 2016, that original Law & Order veteran producer Rick Eid would take Leight's place as showrunner starting in season 18. Creator Dick Wolf commented to The Hollywood Reporter, "I'm extremely pleased that Rick had decided to rejoin the family and hope that he will be here for years to come." During post-production of season 18, following the announcement that SVU was renewed for a nineteenth season, it was revealed that Rick Eid departed the series. He will be taking over another Dick Wolf/NBC series, Chicago P.D.It was announced on May 25, 2017, that original Law & Order and Law & Order: Criminal Intent showrunner Michael S. Chernuchin would be reprising his role starting on season nineteen. Chernuchin was also co-creator and executive producing showrunner of Chicago Justice, another Wolf-related show that was canceled by NBC at the end of the 2016–17 TV season. On April 22, 2019, it was announced that Leight would return as showrunner for the series' twenty-first season. On May 3, 2022, Leight announced that he would not be returning for the twenty-fourth season.
In May 2025, NBC renewed the series for its twenty-seventh season; Michele Fazekas assumed the role of showrunner, becoming the first woman to serve in the position for Special Victims Unit. In April 2026, NBC renewed the series for its twenty-eighth season. Fazekas is expected to return as showrunner.
Casting
Casting for the lead characters of Law & Order: Special Victims Unit occurred in the spring of 1999. Dick Wolf, along with officials from NBC and Studios USA were at the final auditions for the two leads at Rockefeller Center. The last round had been narrowed down to seven finalists. For the female lead, Detective Olivia Benson, actresses Samantha Mathis, Reiko Aylesworth, and Mariska Hargitay were being considered. For the male role, Detective Elliot Stabler, the finalists were Tim Matheson, John Slattery, Nick Chinlund, and Christopher Meloni. Hargitay and Meloni had auditioned in the final round together and, after the actors left, there was a moment of dead silence, after which Wolf blurted out, "Oh well. There's no doubt whom we should choose—Hargitay and Meloni." Wolf believed the duo had the perfect chemistry together from the first time he saw them together, and they ended up being his first choice. Garth Ancier, then head of NBC Entertainment, agreed, and the rest of the panel assembled began voicing their assent.Green and Dawn (2009), p. 11
The first actor to be cast for the show was Dann Florek. Florek had originated the character of Captain Don Cragen in the 1990 pilot for Law & Order, and played the character for the show's first three seasons until he was fired on the orders of network executives, who wanted to add female characters to the all-male primary cast, but he maintained a friendly relationship with Wolf, and went on to direct three episodes of the original series as well as to occasionally guest star on the show. Shortly after Florek reprised his role for Exiled: A Law & Order Movie, he received a call to be on Sex Crimes.Green and Dawn (2009), pp. 145–146 Initially reluctant, he eventually agreed to star on the show as Cragen on the assurance that he would not be asked to audition for the role.Green and Dawn (2009), p. 13
Shortly after the cancellation of Homicide: Life on the Street, Richard Belzer heard that Benjamin Bratt had left Law & Order. Belzer requested his manager to call Wolf and pitch the idea for Belzer's character from Homicide, Detective John Munch, to become the new partner of Jerry Orbach's character, Detective Lennie Briscoe, since they had previously teamed in three Homicide crossovers. Wolf loved the idea, but had already cast Jesse L. Martin as Briscoe's new partner, Detective Ed Green. The idea was reconfigured, but to have Munch on Law & Order: Special Victims Unit instead. Since the character of Munch was inspired by David Simon's depiction of Detective Sergeant Jay Landsman and developed for Homicide by Tom Fontana and Barry Levinson, the addition of Munch to the cast required the consent of all three. The appropriate agreements were reached and, while Fontana and Levinson agreed to waive their royalty rights, contracts with Simon required that he be paid royalties for any new show in which Munch is a main character; as a result, Simon receives royalties every time Munch appears in an episode of the show.Green and Dawn (2009), p. 150