Der Lehrer

The first season was produced already in 2007 but only aired two years later in 2009, reportedly due to a lack of audience interest at the time.

In 2011, RTL decided to continue the show, but starting with the second season the episodes were produced in the standard 45-minute format instead of the original roughly 25-minute net length.

Parts of the first season were shot in the old Gesamtschule Rodenkirchen in Cologne, a building that was replaced by a new construction in 2009; further episodes were filmed at the Lise-Meitner-Gesamtschule in Cologne-Porz.

Season 2 was filmed from April to August 2012 at the former Gemeinschaftshauptschule Worringen in Cologne.

Season 9 was shot at a former Realschule in Bonn-Beuel, which served as the set for the fictional Karoliner-Gymnasium.

Season 10 was filmed from July to October 2025 in Leipzig, using the Johannes-Kepler-Gymnasium Leipzig as the setting for the fictional Lilienthal Oberschule.

Actor Matthias Klimsa, who played Stefan Vollmer's colleague and best friend Rüdiger Matuschek in season 2, only appeared in the first two episodes of season 3 before leaving the series without any stated reason.

In September 2020 it was announced that lead actor Hendrik Duryn would leave the series after season 9, with Simon Böer taking over the lead role as new teacher David Ritter during the course of that season.

Season 4's premiere set a new ratings record for the show, drawing 3.19 million viewers and a 17.5% market share in the target demographic.

Der Lehrer won the Deutscher Fernsehpreis (German Television Award) for Best Series in 2009 and later won the Deutscher Comedypreis for Best Comedy Series in 2014.

The series' early conceptual model is considered to be the show Unser Lehrer Doktor Specht, while similar shows include the Russian series Der Turnlehrer and the Danish series Rita, the latter shown in German on Netflix.