Lighthearted, upbeat shows for adults?

Ted Lasso

Parks and Recreation!

Schitt's Creek

Try Better Off Ted. It only ran for a season and a half but it was funny.

Taskmaster

Would I Lie to You?

Avatar The Last Airbender

Loremen podcast

Edited to add:

One Punch Man first season is hilarious.

The trifecta of 2010s animation: Regular Show, Steven Universe, and Adventure Time. There's jokes and themes in these that are pretty adult, but the darker stuff is generally avoided.

1980s: Dogtanian and the 3 Muskehounds. Mysterious Cities of Gold. Best theme tunes ever, and very easy watching.

Psych

My Name Is Earl is my favorite go-to light-hearted and positive sitcom. Follows the story of a rather silly, ignorant redneck that begins to believe in karma, and so writes a list everyone he has ever wronged and goes about fixing it one by one.

It's pretty good.

Bluey pretends to be for kids but it's surely for adults.

I highly recommend Bob's burgers!

Star Trek: Lower Decks

Good Omens.

I love sitcoms but beneath their light exterior they always have a heart of darkness, or at least a trace of one. But given your OP, I figure you can handle a teensy bit of a shadow side. Here are some generally upbeat shows with lots of laughs.

Catastrophe- I think it strikes the right balance of optimism in the face of doubt. It's light but not saccharine. It's my favorite sitcom.

It Crowd

Black Books

30 Rock

Black-ish

Adventure Time

Mentioned in lots of other replies:

Parks and Rec

New Girl (extremely underrated)

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

Brooklyn 99

Taskmaster

WILTY

Bob's Burgers.

Ted Lasso for the win

Community! If you like The Good Place you'll love it. It's my favorite show of all time

Schitt's Creek (was already mentioned but is worth mentioning again

Brooklyn Nine-Nine

Superstore

Derry Girls

Wellmania (sadly Netflix did a Netflix and discontinued another great show after only one season)

Or just rewatch The Office or Parks & Recreation once again 😄

Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency

Ted Lasso, can't recommend it enough.

Detectorists

Star Trek the next generation

Brooklyn nine nine

One piece

Our Flag Means Death is upbeat in the first season. The second is more dramatic, but also fucking phenomenal. A romantic adventure comedy becomes a romantic adventure dramedy.

Letterkenny!

Scrubs

New Girl

Here's a weird suggestion, watch all Mr. Bean shows. It's like one season and few episodes.

I love "the good place". It's light comedy, it actually makes you think a little, it's a lot of feel good and it's one of those shows where you can see that everyone is having a blast making it.

Edit: I should finish reading the post before commenting, lol.

Permanently Deleted

Agree about Parks & Rec and Black Books

Adding Boston Legal

Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt

If you love "the good place", then I can only recommend "parks and recreation". That is my all-time favorite show

Also recently I have started watching "Chuck". It's a action/comedy/spy series, there is ofcource action, guns and bombs. But Iam laughing so much each episode, I find myself rewatching some scenes.

Letterkenny and Shorsey if not Archer. Trailer Park boys

British panel (game) shows like Would I Lie to You and 8 out or 10 Cats Does Countdown. The game element is just an excuse for funny, interesting people to crack jokes and have a good time.

Happy Endings

Cougar Town

Community

Derry Girls

Parks and Rec

Pushing Daisies. If you like death mixed with comic book sweetness

I don't think there is a more light-hearted show than Detectorists

Kim's Convenience on Netflix.

Schitt’s Creek and Letterkenny deserve some spots here

Scrubs in addition to a bunch of the great suggestions in here.

The Venture Brothers is hilarious.

Not adult, but The Owl House was a surprisingly good one. One of those multi-audience shows. Makes me think a lot of about the type of parent I want to be someday!

How to with John Wilson, 30 Rock, Malcolm in the Middle, The Office, Nathan for You, Parks and Rec, Joe Pera Talks to You, Ted Lasso, Baskets (LOVE it, but can be a little sad and heartbreaking in addition to being hilarious and sweet)

Close Enough is a really great animated tv show by the creator of Regular Show. It's basically almost the same, but for adults.

Also, Workaholics

Eureka is kind of a disaster of the week pseudoscience problem show with a lot of heart. Don't go looking for true scifi, but it's so damn charming and the cast has exceptional chemistry.

Pushing Daisies.

Upload

Going for the more obscure: Bajillion Dollar Properties. Originally made for a dead streaming service, now exists on PlutoTV for free (and can be purchased through Apple et al). It's a satire of real estate reality shows with phenomenal guest stars throughout. Main cast includes a few folks before they got their bigger roles (like Tawny Newsome, Drew Tarver, and Eugene Cordero) but also includes the GOAT, Paul F. Tompkins.

Very related, I would also suggest the Comedy Bang! Bang! TV show that ran for 5 seasons on IFC. It's a treasure trove of comedic goodness, lots of great guests, and who doesn't love Reggie Watts, Kid Cudi, then Weird Al as the band leaders??

Joe Pera Talks To You

Recently I watched and enjoyed Parks and Recreation and One Day at a Time (netflix series). Light hearted engaging content. Another recommendation: Schitt's Creek.

Parks and Recreation. So funny. If you like the office you’ll love it!

Frasier

It's Always Sunny?

On the surface, it contains terrible people doing terrible things, but it's both comedic and condemns those terrible things

Scrubs

I haven't seen anyone say galavant, that's a shame, somehow it got 2 seasons, and it's brilliant the whole way through. If princess Bride had more back story arcs, fewer restrictions on how over the top they could make their characters, and was a musical, you'd have galavant.

Letterkenny

It is cancelled now, but Last Man on Earth is such a great show.

'Ghosts' on CBS/Paramount+ is sweet, funny, lighthearted for the subject matter, and overall very enjoyable. I don't think it will win any awards, but its a great alternative to all the dark and cynical stuff out there!

Lots of good suggestions so far, but not seen The Great mentioned. Filthy AF and one of the few shows I laugh out loud to (well, more like cackle loudly). I'll also second the suggestion for Better Off Ted.

Close Enough.

It's only one season, but Wonderfalls. It's pure joy. And all the episodes are on Youtube.

Schmigadoon!

It's very light-hearted and campy. Well, at least the first season is.

The Great North, if you want to watch a fun and wholesome cartoon.

The Last Man on Earth

If you're a weeb there's an entire genre of this stuff: iyashi-kei ("soothing type/genre"). I've enjoyed a bunch of them, though some of them get pretty saccharine if that's a worry. There's a large overlap with "slice of life", and a lot of these are set in school for whatever reason - YMMV. I like Azumanga Daioh, though the anime adaptation is a little aged. Nichijou is adorable and leans more into absurdism if that's your thing. "Yotsuba&!" is freaking precious, but manga only - same guy as Azumanga Daioh.

For non-weeb stuff I'll mention Brooklyn Nine-Nine, also Parks and Recreation once it hits its stride.

I'd highly recommend Avenue 5.

Bee and puppycat

Trailerpark Boys

Letterkenny

Dead to me starts off as if it's going to be dark but is actually pretty lighthearted

Just started watching Deadbeat, doesn't take itself seriously and I'm laughing most of the time. Easy watching.

Obscure show, but watch Traffic Light on prime.

Red Oaks

Awkwafina is Nora From Queens

Doc Martin

Broad City is pretty light-hearted

Community Great British Baking Challege (in US, it's Bake-off everywhere else) Brooklyn Nine Nine Thirty Rock And seriously, The Golden Girls

"Miracle Workers" hasn't been mentioned yet, it has a similar vibe, romantic comedy, some mild philosophy, very upbeat. Each season is a different storyline with (almost) the same cast, so if the first season doesn't grab you try the next. The creator had an earlier show "Man Seeking Woman" as well, that's fun too.

A lot of great shows mentioned. To add to the list of upbeat the gf and I are working our way through Modern Family. The early seasons are pretty upbeat and lighthearted. I do wonder where they will end up in the later seasons as the families age.

Working Moms is something the gf watches and what I've seen had been pretty great and has some good fun shock value. I'm surprised where they go with some of the humour. Usually only animated shows get away with this.

I would add Archer but I haven't finished the last couple of seasons so I'm not sure where it ends up on the fun and outrageous scale.

• Lost in Space
• Firefly
• The Orville
• Star Trek: Next Generation
• Cowboy Bebop (The Anime)
• Disenchantment
• Futurama
• Arrested Development
• The Office

American Dad, starting at season 2, is complete gold.

The first season is rough, since the political comedy elements aren’t quite finetuned, which makes the characters a bit annoying, and Roger doesn’t have wacky disguises yet. Season 2 onwards the show has just right right wavelength of bizarre non-sequitur humor that always makes me smile. The jokes can be dark and/or adult, or just require context to understand but I think they are great.

I'm rewatching Castlevania from Netflix and it kinda fits your criteria.

Shrinking

Thermae Romae Novae is novel and hilarious

Gilmore Girls is a classic feel good show that I'm surprised hasn't been mentioned. Its pretty campy occasionally, but sometimes that's what you need.

Also Ed.

Tacoma FD, Letterkenny, Shoresy, Miracle Workers, Poker Face, Resident Alien, Ghosts (US), The White Lotus, Shrinking, Ash vs Evil Dead, The Adventures of Brisco County, Jr.

I haven't seen a recommendation for Tacoma FD. Made by two of the Super Trooper crew. Far more toned down. Great cast. Awesome guest stars. Silly, fun and pretty wholesome.

Poker Face

The Good Witch

Steven Universe (it's accessible to adults on a different level than kids)

Check out Wonderfalls. It's one of the stranger things I've seen, but quite brilliant. The Good Place reminded me of it in many ways, although they are very different shows.

We always just watch Gogglebox if we don’t want to be depressed by something.

Not sure what you mean by shows but if you like cars, the grand tour with the 3 amazing top gear brits.

I'm not even a big fan of cars, I just find them interesting and love watching people talking about them with so much passion. Also, my curious mind just thinks cars are neat and I like to see how they work even though I'm too afraid to even do the tiniest thing as an oil change on mine c:

The Good Place

Sorting from 1 being the worse and 6 being the best in my opinion these are the shows that I found entertaining and recommend you giving a watch

• 1 better call saul drama

• 2 breaking bad drama

• 3 still game comedy

• 4 it's always sunny comedy

• 5 it crowd comedy

• 6 father ted comedy

You may find it difficult to understand what the characters are saying in still game due to the cast being entirely Scottish I won't spoil it for you just give it a watch

Go outside.

Bojack Horseman