To pretty much everyone’s displeasure, one of the world’s most beloved sit-comes is coming to an end. The last episode of the tenth season of Modern Family aired recently, and it’s been officially announced that season 11 will be the last. The show aired back in 2009, and it’s been going strong for a decade, without ever losing its ability to make audiences cry, both with laughter and emotion.
The Pritchett-Dunphy clan had many unforgettable moments, and it’s a testament to the show’s unbending quality its impressive track record of award-wins. This, of course, includes Golden Globes and Emmy Awards, and more than 358 nominations. These achievements are 100% deserved, and it’s safe to say the three families that have accompanied us for a decade will be dearly missed. In honor of the imminent ending of the show, here are ten hilarious episodes of Modern Family to watch over and over again, that will stay funny forever.
Updated April 1st, 2020 by Mariana Fernandes: With our beloved show, Modern Family, currently airing its last season, there’s no time like the present to re-visit our favorite episodes. We laughed, cried, and felt the pains and joys of the Pritchett-Dunphy clan for ten seasons. Saying goodbye is going to be hard, but there’s no reason we can’t go back and re-watch the most hilarious episodes, featuring Claire, Gloria, Jay, and everyone else!
15 Las Vegas (Season 5, Episode 18)
Episodes that feature the entire family traveling together always pave the way for a hilarious episode featuring plenty of action! In season five’s “Las Vegas”, the whole clan got together for a weekend in the city of sin. Perhaps the funniest part of the whole 20-minutes was Jay trying to flex his connections – and failing miserably.
The episode also included Cam betraying Mitchell (in a hilarious way), Claire trying to make back the money she lost years before, and Phil attempting to join a very exclusive magic club. What’s not to love?
14 Caught In The Act (Season 2, Episode 13)
If there’s one thing Modern Family excels at, it’s definitely being relatable. And few moments on the show were as relatable as when Alex, Haley, and Luke caught Phil and Claire having sex when they were about to give them their anniversary gift. The whole moment was cringeworthy and hilarious!
The added storylines of Gloria attempting to retrieve a bad email and Mitch and Cam trying to cover up a bad mess just make this a wholesome episode, fit for giggles.
13 Fulgencio (Season 4, Episode 13)
Gloria’s family isn’t prominently featured on the show, but when it is…it’s fire! The season four episode “Fulgencio” saw Gloria, her mother, and Jay fight over what name to give the newborn baby. And even though this main plot is laugh-out-loud funny, the side plots are some of the best the show’s seen.
These include Phil trying to help only to end up turning into a friendly version of The Godfather and Mitch and Cam arguing over who’s the worst parent because Lily has been acting out. Modern Family prime!
12 American Skyper (Season 6, Episode 24)
The season finale of the sixth season of the show was jam-packed with emotion. Once again, a member of the clan reaches another milestone, this time in the form of Alex graduating highschool. Phil is present in robot form, to everyone’s entertainment and delight, and Cam is dealing with his new braces while Mitch lost his job.
The high note of the episode arrives when Haley finds out Andy has feelings for her too and rushes to the beach to try and stop him from getting engaged. So many feelings, and so much to deal within 20 minutes!
11 My Funky Valentine (Season 1, Episode 15)
And for a real trip down memory lane, why not go all the way back to season one when we were just getting to know the family and warming up to them all? It’s no secret that the show loves to have episodes dedicated to special holidays and events. “My Funky Valentine” was the first Valentine’s episode ever, and it delivered!
What makes this episode so iconic, aside from the hilarious plot lines, of course, is the fact that we are introduced to Phil and Claire’s sexy alter-egos for the first time. Clive Bixby and Juliana? Sign us up!
10 Halloween (Season 2, Episode 6)
No one does holidays quite like the Dunphys and the Pritchetts. Halloween in particular always tends to be a particularly eventful time of the year for the families, each year better than the previous, especially for Claire, whose love for Halloween rivals Phil’s love for all things technology.
The sixth episode of the second season brings us a very haunted house, courtesy of the Dunphys, a hilarious Mitchel dressed as a Spider-Man turned Hulk in disguise as he desperately tries to fit in and it backfires, and Jay and Manny have a little too much of a laugh at the expense of the short-tempered Gloria. The whole episode makes for the perfect watch, along with all the Halloween candy you’ve been hiding in the kitchen!
9 The Kiss (Season 2, Episode 2)
Everybody knows the Pritchett siblings have a few issues that come along with being raised by Jay. Many times, these issues are portrayed in a funny, innocent way, and this time around, the show decided to tackle Mitchel’s aversion to public displays of affection, which annoys Cam and makes for pretty hilarious scenes.
We also see Gloria trying to reconnect with her Colombian roots and cooking some questionable meals that don’t particularly please Jay, as well as Claire’s overbearing reaction to finding out Alex likes a boy. In good old Modern Family fashion, the entire family eventually comes together while each of the clans deals with their own respective issues… in the funniest way possible.
8 Baby On Board (Season 3, Episode 24)
This show has a very rare ability to produce episodes that make us both laugh hysterically and cry uncontrollably. The last episode of the third season had its hilarious moments thanks to the mockery of the typical telenovela that fits wonderfully with the plot, and Alex’s revelation of her—clearly gay—prom date she threatens to sleep with in order to be taken seriously by her family.
Cam and Mitchel’s attempt to adopt a second child also comes to an end with this episode, in quite a heart-wrenching way, that soon turns into a quiet, emotional moment between the couple and the audience. It feels like an unbelievably long journey for a 25 minute-long episode, but it’s still one of the absolute best in the whole show.
7 Virgin Territory (Season 3, Episode 16)
It’s always been an absolute joy to witness the growing bond between Manny and Luke. These two have such great chemistry, it always makes for some serious quality TV. Thankfully, we are blessed with plenty of it during this episode, when Luke tries to help Manny impress a girl through some doubtful means.
Among other smalle—but obviously hilarious)—plots, Alex’s revelation to her father that Hailey is no longer a virgin takes central stage, against the backdrop of a doll clinic. The whole scenario makes the revelation that much more intense, and Phil’s reaction that much funnier. Once again, Modern Family manages to be extremely relatable, without losing its comedic impact.
6 Treehouse (Season 3, Episode 7)
Treehouse is a blessing of an episode because it gives us one of the best plot drivers in the entire show; slight couple disagreements. The cast of the show works in such harmony with each other, that watching the adult members of the family go about married life each with their problems, but in such a witty way, becomes one of the biggest strengths it has.
In this particular case, we get to see Gloria try and get Jay to do more things with her a couple (we eventually get some fantastic salsa dancing action) and Cameron and Mitchel making a bet that drives the former to try and hit on a woman. Phil’s journey of building Luke a treehouse is a gem, and the episode as a whole is just another comedy masterpiece.
5 Yard Sale (Season 4, Episode 6)
Gloria’s past tends to be a mystery, mostly because of the showrunners’ knack for using her potential criminal background in Colombia as a comic trigger—which works wonders, in all honesty. The way Gloria herself talks about it always leaves the audience wonder, and this particular episode makes perfect use of it, and it actually reveals something!
The entire action revolves around a yard sale at Jay and Gloria’s, as we explore Alex’s unwillingness to accept her boyfriend’s sexuality, Jay’s grumpiness at strangers running around his house, and Many and Luke’s curiosity in regards to Gloria’s mystery box that ends up being something no one was expecting.
4 Party Crasher (Season 4, Episode 12)
Gloria’s pregnancy is about to come to an end, but she refuses to let the child be born on Manny’s birthday… especially when she tried so hard to put together a surprise party for him! As it always happens on the show, poor Manny ends up having more than he asked for, much to the dismay of poor Gloria.
Undeniably though, the funniest moments of the episode are brought about from Cam’s jealousy of Mitchel and Lily’s relationship and Phil’s struggle while he witnesses Hayley dating a man who just happens to be twice her age in the midst of a very complicated time for their father-daughter relationship. We get our fair share of emotional moments, which makes the episode even better.
3 Schooled (Season 4, Episode 2)
This is arguably one of the most well-rounded episodes of the whole show. Each small plot is told in equal chunks, and, once again, the funny is… well, really funny, and the emotional is heart-wrenching. This is the episode where Phil and Claire send Hailey off to college, Jay and Gloria attend a parenting class, and Cam and Mitchel find themselves at odds with a lesbian couple at Lily’s school.
The entire episode is building towards the final moments of each character’s arch, in a way only Modern Family knows how without ever losing the clever puns. There’s enough room for Hailey’s homesickness and relatable fear, Phil and Claire’s emotional journey, and Manny’s admission of worry for his unborn sibling.
2 The Wedding, Part 2 (Season 5, Episode 24)
This episode is for Mitchel and Cameron, and we couldn’t be happier for them. The previous episode was a rollercoaster, and it seemed like everything about the wedding we saw the happy couple spend an entire season plan simply wouldn’t happen. Thankfully, things took a turn for the best, and they had the wedding they truly deserved.
Not a dry eye on the screen, and surely not a dry eye in the audience pretty much throughout the whole thing. The episode was so light-hearted but so meaningful at the same time. It was the perfect ending to the fifth season of the show that finally gave the fans a chance to celebrate the marriage that should have happened long ago.
1 Connection Lost (Season 6, Episode 16)
It is undeniable that Modern Family does a lot of things right, and one of them is storytelling. It takes a lot of talent to develop a narrative, make it funny, pace it correctly, and the show does all of these things wonderfully, with the art down to a tee. And there’s no better proof than the masterpiece that was the sixth episode of season 6.
The entire episode is done through Claire’s perspective while she’s at the airport, waiting for a flight to take her home, and she can’t find Hailey. All through FaceTime calls, photo albums, text messages, and web searches, we get a compelling, hilarious, well thought-out storyline, unlike anything we’ve seen before on TV.
