Documentary Podcasts

Dirty John

34 episodes - Latest episode: 2 months ago - ★★★★★ - 40.3K ratings
Debra Newell is a successful interior designer. She meets John Meehan, a handsome man who seems to check all the boxes: attentive, available, just back from a year in Iraq with Doctors With...

Ear Hustle

73 episodes - Latest episode: about 2 months ago - ★★★★★ - 17.8K ratings
Ear Hustle brings you the daily realities of life inside prison shared by those living it, and stories from the outside, post-incarceration. The podcast is a partnership between Nigel Poor,...

Dolly Parton's America

13 episodes - Latest episode: about 1 month ago - ★★★★★ - 15.4K ratings
In this intensely divided moment, one of the few things everyone still seems to agree on is Dolly Parton—but why? That simple question leads to a deeply personal, historical, and musical rethinking...

Snap Judgment Presents: Spooked

52 episodes - Latest episode: 9 months ago - ★★★★★ - 11K ratings
Spooked features true-life supernatural stories, told firsthand by people who can barely believe it happened themselves. Be afraid. Created in the dark of night, by Snap Judgment and WNYC Studios. ...

True Crime All The Time

434 episodes - Latest episode: 3 days ago - ★★★★★ - 10.2K ratings
Hosts Mike Ferguson and Mike Gibson guide you through the most interesting true crime stories. This is a true crime podcast that spares none of the details and delves into what makes these ...

Scene on Radio

93 episodes - Latest episode: 7 months ago - ★★★★★ - 9.8K ratings
Scene on Radio is a Peabody-nominated podcast that dives deeply into issues central to American society, exploring who we were and who we are. Recent many-part series include Seeing White, ...

Unobscured

63 episodes - Latest episode: 3 months ago - ★★★★★ - 7K ratings
History is full of stories we think we know. They are old and dark, but time has robbed us of perspective and clarity. They've become obscured and misunderstood. Which is why this series exists: to...

Accused

39 episodes - Latest episode: 4 months ago - ★★★★ - 6.7K ratings
Season 3: In 1984, a father of three disappeared while working at a mysterious Cincinnati plant. It turned out he’d met a gruesome fate: Pieces of bone, his eyeglasses and walkie-talkie wer...

This Is Actually Happening

243 episodes - Latest episode: 3 days ago - ★★★★★ - 4.5K ratings
What if your mother left to follow a cult… or you woke up in a morgue… or if your boat got caught in a storm and began to sink -- what would you do?   This is Actually Happening brings you ...

Kamala: Next in Line

14 episodes - Latest episode: 2 months ago - ★★★★ - 3.2K ratings
Kamala Harris will become Vice President following one of the most tumultuous elections in U.S. history. Hosted by MSNBC’s Joy Reid, “Kamala: Next In Line” tells the cross-cultural journey ...

Best Case Worst Case

250 episodes - Latest episode: about 4 hours ago - ★★★★ - 2.3K ratings
We take you behind police lines. Former FBI profiler Jim Clemente & former federal prosecutor Francey Hakes get unparalleled access to law enforcement officers, looking back at their most me...

Canary: The Washington Post Investigates

8 episodes - Latest episode: 10 months ago - ★★★★★ - 2.1K ratings
After a sexual assault case in the District of Columbia, one woman’s public warning ricochets all the way to Birmingham, Ala., where another woman gives voice to a devastating allegation. This se...

Radio Diaries

161 episodes - Latest episode: about 1 month ago - ★★★★★ - 1.1K ratings
First-person diaries, sound portraits, and hidden chapters of history from Peabody Award-winning producer Joe Richman and the Radio Diaries team. From teenagers to octogenarians, prisoners t...

The Thread

66 episodes - Latest episode: about 2 months ago - ★★★★ - 1.1K ratings
Explore history's interlocking lives and events. Turn back the clock, one story at a time. Discover how various strands are woven together to create a historic figure, a big idea or an unthinkable ...

Carruth

11 episodes - Latest episode: 6 months ago - ★★★★★ - 972 ratings
The "miracle" began Nov. 16, 1999, when Cherica Adams was shot four times in Charlotte, N.C. A hitman tried to murder Adams, the girlfriend of NFL star Rae Carruth, and their unborn son, Chancellor...

Larger Than Life

22 episodes - Latest episode: 2 months ago - ★★★★ - 787 ratings
In 1960s Los Angeles, after the catastrophic Watts riots, an outsized character emerged — one who found an unexpected way to unite people across race and class. Odds are you’ve never heard ...

In Plain Sight: Lady Bird Johnson

9 episodes - Latest episode: 4 months ago - ★★★★★ - 722 ratings
"In Plain Sight: Lady Bird Johnson" presents a surprising and original portrait of Lady Bird Johnson, told in the former first lady's own words -- from over 123 hours of her White House audio diari...

Following Harriet

6 episodes - Latest episode: about 1 month ago - ★★★★★ - 712 ratings
Following Harriet is a podcast that takes a closer look at the life of one of the bravest and most extraordinary women in our country’s history. It also puts Harriet in a broader context, examining...

Crime After Crime

48 episodes - Latest episode: 29 days ago - ★★★★★ - 697 ratings
A monthly podcast where two true crime YouTubers, Danelle Hallan and John Lordan, challenge each other to tell the best story about a true crime related topic. Listeners voting online will determi...

Dark Histories

114 episodes - Latest episode: 3 days ago - ★★★★★ - 673 ratings
Bi-weekly narratives on the unsolved and the unexplained, mysteries, historical true crime, touches of the paranormal and cultural peculiarities.

Resistance

19 episodes - Latest episode: about 1 month ago - ★★★★★ - 647 ratings
Resistance is a show about refusing to accept things as they are. Stories from the front lines of the movement for Black lives, told by the generation fighting for change. Hosted by Saidu Tejan-Tho...

Ephemeral

29 episodes - Latest episode: 4 days ago - ★★★★★ - 602 ratings
The best source on our cultural identity is not the official, historical record — ask any anthropologist, it’s the town dump. Ephemera — those things that were just barely saved, and in some cases ...

Murder Dictionary

136 episodes - Latest episode: 2 months ago - ★★★★ - 570 ratings
MURDER DICTIONARY {mer-der dik-she-ner-e} : a humorous discussion between true crime fanatics : an exploration of multiple cases based on the weekly topic, following the letter sequence of the alph...

Bates Investigates

25 episodes - Latest episode: 5 months ago - ★★★★★ - 432 ratings
Season One: The most in-depth serialized look into the case of Oklahoma vs. Daniel Holtzclaw, as told from the perspective of the prosecution, but with the scrutiny of the defense.

Hi-Phi Nation

46 episodes - Latest episode: 9 months ago - ★★★★★ - 414 ratings
Hi-Phi Nation is philosophy in story-form, integrating narrative journalism with big ideas. We look at stories from everyday life, law, science, popular culture, and strange corners of human experi...

Lost Hills

11 episodes - Latest episode: about 1 month ago - ★★★★ - 405 ratings
On June 22, 2018, 35-year-old scientist Tristan Beaudette is brutally murdered in front of his two young daughters while camping in idyllic Malibu Creek State Park. The killing stuns the tight-knit...

Blamo!

366 episodes - Latest episode: 4 days ago - ★★★★★ - 364 ratings
Designers, creative directors, actors, athletes: Blamo! explores the world of fashion with the people who shape it. Each week, founder Jeremy Kirkland speaks with a different guest about their jo...

Reparations: The Big Payback

13 episodes - Latest episode: 2 months ago - ★★★★ - 345 ratings
Reparations: The Big Payback is an immersive, narrative podcast, hosted by social justice filmmakers Erika Alexander (Living Single, Get Out) and Whitney Dow (Two Towns of Jasper, Whiteness Project...

Inside a Sinister Mind

15 episodes - Latest episode: 13 days ago - ★★★★★ - 334 ratings
Get an inside look into Conejo's spiritual journey as a wanted man with an underground music career. With over 100 albums released, the legendary MC opens up about his life on the run. After an air...

Trafficked with Mariana van Zeller

7 episodes - Latest episode: 7 months ago - ★★★★★ - 291 ratings
The official companion podcast to National Geographic’s eight-part series, Trafficked with Mariana van Zeller. Join investigative journalist Mariana van Zeller after each episode as she sits down w...