In 2006, at age 14 and with no acting experience, Scodelario was cast in the first series of
Skins as
Effy Stonem. At the auditions, she became discouraged as she felt she was too young, but a producer told her to stay and she was asked to read for the part. While Scodelario's role in the first series had minimal speaking lines, her character developed considerably during the second series. She eventually became the central character in the third and fourth series after the cast had been replaced by a new generation of characters. This made Effy one of the only characters to appear from series 1 all the way through to series 4. Filming began in July and Scodelario said that 18 November 2009 was her last day of filming the series and that she would miss being on the show. Critics praised her performance, and she was nominated twice for Best Actress at the
TV Quick Awards, in 2009 and 2010. In the episode "
Fire", one of three parts of the seventh (and final) season of
Skins, Scodelario reprised the role of Effy. It is a two-part depiction of her life as an adult, lasting two hours. She claims "Fire" is "more like a movie" and that she could relate to Effy's struggle to change from a teenager into an adult. Scodelario made her film debut in the science fiction-
thriller film
Moon, which premiered at the 2009
Sundance Film Festival, receiving positive reviews. In her second film,
Shank, released on 26 March 2010, she played teenager Tasha. In addition, she appeared in the 2010 remake of
Clash of the Titans as Peshet. In April 2010, Scodelario confirmed her casting as Cathy in an adaptation of
Wuthering Heights directed by
Andrea Arnold. The film premiered at the
Venice Film Festival in 2011 to generally positive reviews, and Scodelario was hailed as a "heart-wrenching revelation".
Wuthering Heights also played at several other international film festivals, including the 2011
Toronto International Film Festival, the
London Film Festival, and the 2012
Sundance Film Festival. " by
Robbie Williams In 2011, she signed on to play Sally Weaver in a British thriller,
Twenty8k. The film was released in September 2012. In late June, Scodelario announced that she had signed on to star in
Now Is Good with
Dakota Fanning. The film is based on
Jenny Downham's novel
Before I Die, about a teenage girl with leukaemia who makes a list of things to do before she dies. She portrays Zoey, the protagonist's best friend. In September 2011, Scodelario filmed a television serial for
BBC One,
True Love, an improvised series comprising five stand-alone episodes, each covering a different love-related dilemma. She is cast in the third storyline as Karen, the love interest of her teacher, portrayed by
Billie Piper. In January 2012, Scodelario made her first American film,
The Truth About Emanuel, in Los Angeles. She stars as the title character, Emanuel, a troubled 17-year-old girl who babysits her new neighbour Linda's "baby", which is actually a very lifelike doll. It had a limited release on 10 January 2014. In April 2012, Scodelario shot a cameo appearance for the film
Spike Island. She also participated in an advertising campaign for Korean jewelry brand J. Estina. In 2013, she starred in the four-part
Channel 4 drama series
Southcliffe, which tells the story of a fictional English town devastated by a spate of shootings, exploring the tragedy through the eyes of a journalist and those close to the victims. She signed on to the film franchise
The Maze Runner in April 2013 as the lead female character, Teresa, in the first film, based on the
novel of the same name by
James Dashner. It was released in September 2014, and its sequel,
Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials, in September 2015. She filmed the lead role in the film adaptation of
The Moon and the Sun in 2014, but the film was not released until 2022, under the title ''
The King's Daughter. She starred in the home-invasion thriller Tiger House, released in 2015, and also had a starring role in the sequel Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales'', which was released on 26 May 2017. Scodelario reprised the role of Teresa in
Maze Runner: The Death Cure. The film was set for release on 17 February 2017, but after her co-star
Dylan O'Brien was injured on set, it was pushed back to 26 January 2018. The year 2019 brought new projects for Scodelario. The first, released in May, was
Extremely Wicked, Shockingly Evil and Vile, about serial killer
Ted Bundy; she portrays his wife, Carole Ann Boone. She played the lead in
Alexandre Aja's horror film
Crawl, which was released in July to positive reviews. Her next film, 2021's
Resident Evil: Welcome to Raccoon City, saw Scodelario lead another horror film, this time portraying video game character
Claire Redfield as a main protagonist. Scodelario then signed up to lead a new
Netflix series, an edgy
figure skating drama called
Spinning Out in 2019. Debuting in early 2020, the series explored multi-person mental illness within a family and its interaction with high-level competitive sports. In spring 2019, Scodelario became the face of
Cartier's new jewelry line, Clash de Cartier, and filmed the latest
Agatha Christie miniseries adaptation,
The Pale Horse, for Amazon and BBC. In August 2021, Scodelario joined dramedy ''
Don't Make Me Go being developed under Amazon Studios, and filmed This Is Christmas the next summer. Scodelario filmed two series for Netflix in 2023: The Gentlemen, inspired by the Guy Ritchie film of the same name, and Senna
, a biographical drama about the Brazilian Formula One driver Ayrton Senna, where she played a fictional, though important character of a reporter called Laura Harrison. In 2025, she starred in the Netflix thriller film The Woman in Cabin 10''. ==Personal life==