The series was announced by BBC executive Danny Cohen on 18 February 2013 as a British-American co-production, commissioned alongside BBC Drama controller Ben Stephenson.

This six-part adaptation of Tolstoy's 1869 novel was written by Andrew Davies and produced by BBC Cymru Wales in association with The Weinstein Company, Lookout Point and BBC Worldwide.

The cast, led by Paul Dano, Lily James and James Norton, was officially announced on 28 December 2014.

Filming began in February 2015 and took place on location in Russia, Lithuania and Latvia.

The production used Arri Alexa digital cameras paired with anamorphic lenses specifically for their bokeh focus fall-off effects.

The soundtrack for the series was composed by Martin Phipps.

The series scored 88% on Rotten Tomatoes with an average rating of 8.4/10 from 25 reviews, and 72/100 on Metacritic based on 11 critics.

The Telegraph ranked it fifth on its list of the greatest television adaptations of all time, calling it the greatest TV costume drama of the past decade.

The UK broadcast consisted of five 60-minute episodes plus an 82-minute finale, while the US version aired as four two-hour episodes simulcast across A&E, Lifetime and History Channel; a later Amazon Prime version repackaged it into 8 shorter episodes totaling 348 minutes, 34 minutes shorter than the original BBC cut.