Best journalism Podcasts

"'A podcast about the internet' that is actually an unfailingly original exploration of modern life and how to survive it." - The Guardian. Hosted by Alex Goldman and Emmanuel Dzotsi from Gimlet.

Serial returns with a history of Guantánamo told by people who lived through key moments in Guantánamo’s evolution, who know things the rest of us don’t about what it’s like to be caught inside an improvised justice system.Serial Productions makes narrative podcasts whose quality and innovation transformed the medium. “Serial” began in 2014 as a spinoff of the public radio show “This American Life.” In 2020, we joined the New York Times Company. Our shows have reached many millions of listeners and have won nearly every major journalism award for audio, including the first-ever Peabody Award given to a podcast.Subscribe to our newsletter for the latest Serial Productions news: https://bit.ly/3FIOJj9Have thoughts or feedback on our shows? Email us at serialshows@nytimes.com Soon, you’ll need a subscription to keep full access to this show, and to other New York Times podcasts, on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. Don’t miss out on exploring all our shows covering politics, pop culture and much more. Subscribe today at nytimes.com/podcasts.

The stories behind the world's most recognizable and interesting sounds.

In the Dark, hosted by Madeleine Baran, is an award-winning investigative-journalism podcast that started in 2016. Its first season looked at the mysterious abduction of Jacob Wetterling in rural Minnesota and the lack of accountability that sheriffs face when they fail to solve cases. Season 2 examined the case of Curtis Flowers, who was tried six times for the same crime. In 2020, In the Dark released a special report on the coronavirus pandemic in the Mississippi Delta. In 2023, In the Dark joined The New Yorker and Condé Nast. “The Runaway Princesses,” a four-part series that asks why the women in Dubai’s royal family keep trying to run away, came out in January. In the Dark is a two-time Peabody Award winner and, in 2019, became the first podcast to win a George Polk Award, one of the top honors in journalism. The program has also received an Alfred I. duPont-Columbia University Award and a Robert F. Kennedy Journalism Award.

Ten years ago, over three hundred men, women and children disappeared from a small town in Tennessee, never to be heard from again. In this podcast, American Public Radio reporter Lia Haddock asks the question once more, "What happened to the people of Limetown?" Limetown is produced by Two-Up, the producers of 36 Questions, The Wilderness and Shipworm.

In the war on terror, who is it that we’re really fighting? “Caliphate” follows Rukmini Callimachi, who covers terrorism for The New York Times, on her quest to understand ISIS. For more information about the series, visit nytimes.com/caliphate. This series includes disturbing language and scenes of graphic violence. Producer: Andy Mills; Reporters: Rukmini Callimachi and Andy Mills; Managing Producer: Larissa Anderson; Editors: Wendy Dorr and Larissa Anderson; Associate Producer: Asthaa Chaturvedi; Technical Director: Brad Fisher; Executive Producer, NYT Audio: Lisa Tobin; Editorial Director, NYT Audio: Samantha Henig; Assistant Managing Editor, NYT: Sam Dolnick; Music: William Brittelle, Andy Mills, Nate Henricks, Cliff Martinez, Brad Fisher, Taku Sugimoto and David Wingo

“Unmapped" is a travel podcast about getting off the beaten path and discovering new experiences near and far. Millennial travel blogger Angelina Zeppieri takes you along on her adventures, and sits down with global nomads and fellow wanderers around the world. From Uncover Studios. New episodes every other Wednesday.

In 2018, famed horror writer Anna Sheridan disappeared, leaving behind only a box of mysterious cassette tapes. Detective Sam Bailey is tasked with piecing together what happened to Anna Sheridan from the seemingly impossible encounters she recorded, but as the scattered pieces of the puzzle come together, Bailey discovers that the picture is even stranger – and more dangerous – than it seemed.

For ten years, a serial arsonist terrorized Southern California, burning down businesses in broad daylight. Four people were murdered. Then, a manuscript for a novel led investigators to the last person they would have ever suspected.Want the full story? Unlock all episodes of Firebug, ad-free, right now by subscribing to The Binge. Plus, get binge access to brand new stories dropping on the first of every month — that’s all episodes, all at once, all ad-free.Just click ‘Subscribe’ on the top of the Firebug show page on Apple Podcasts or visit GetTheBinge.com to get access wherever you listen.A Truth Media & Sony Music Entertainment production.Find out more about The Binge and other podcasts from Sony Music Entertainment at sonymusic.com/podcasts and follow us @sonypodcasts."

For the past two years, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist Ronan Farrow has been following a trail of clues from his investigation of Harvey Weinstein to other blockbuster stories about the systems that protect powerful men accused of terrible crimes in Hollywood, Washington, and beyond. But he didn’t bring that information to light on his own. A compelling cast of sources—from brave whistleblowers to shadowy undercover operatives—decided the fate of these investigations, sometimes risking everything in the process. The Catch and Kill Podcast brings you their stories, in their own words, for the first time.

The Peabody Award-winning On the Media podcast is your guide to examining how the media sausage is made. Hosts Brooke Gladstone and Micah Loewinger examine threats to free speech and government transparency, cast a skeptical eye on media coverage of the week’s big stories and unravel hidden political narratives in everything we read, watch and hear.

Citations Needed is a podcast about the intersection of media, PR, and power, hosted by Nima Shirazi and Adam Johnson.

Named a best podcast of 2023 by Vulture, Time, The Economist, & Vogue.No question too big, no question too small. On Search Engine, host PJ Vogt answers the kinds of questions you might ask the internet when you can't sleep. If you find the world bewildering, but also sometimes enjoy being bewildered by it, we're here for you. Edited by Sruthi Pinnamaneni.

A biweekly film podcast! One Film Topic, Two Weeks, Lots of Movies, Even More Opinions!

Will Ferrell reprises his role as Ron Burgundy in the world-famous Ron Burgundy Podcast! Each episode has a different theme in which Ron engages in conversation with another notable person on the topic at hand. In true Ron Burgundy fashion, these conversations have a tendency to go off the rails, and we find out things about people we never knew we wanted to know. Join America’s favorite Anchorman, continuing to delight audiences with the comical musings of Ron Burgundy – and leave them wanting more!

Get a daily burst of illumination from The Economist’s worldwide network of correspondents. Our reporters dig past the headlines to get to the stories beneath—and to stories that aren’t making headlines, but should be. A unique perspective on the issues and events shaping your world.Sign up for Economist Podcasts+ at http://www.economist.com/podcastsplus-intelligence.If you’re already a subscriber to The Economist, you’ll have full access to all our shows as part of your subscription.For more information about Economist Podcasts+, including how to get access, please visit our FAQs page at https://myaccount.economist.com/s/article/What-is-Economist-Podcasts

Millions of kids can't read well. Scientists have known for decades how children learn to read but many schools are ignoring the research. They buy teacher training and books that are rooted in a disproven idea. Emily Hanford investigates four authors and a publishing company that have made millions selling this idea.

The people behind The Intercept’s fearless reporting and incisive commentary discuss the crucial issues of our time: national security, civil liberties, foreign policy, and criminal justice. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

Our fifth season is Decoding John Ford, a seven-episode series about cinema's most mysterious auteur. Using scores of never-before-heard archival interviews, host Ben Mankiewicz strips back John Ford's self-spun mythology to reveal his brilliance behind the camera – alongside the often ugly, uncomfortable truths about his life and movies, asking whether we can ever truly separate art from the artist. Decoding John Ford starts June 6.

Sick is an investigative podcast about what goes wrong in the places meant to keep us healthy. Sick's first season explores the complications of fertility medicine, one Indiana doctor’s abuse of power and the generations of lives he affected.Season 2, we turn our attention to prisons— places that have to keep people healthy, but are built to punish them. New episodes start Oct. 26.

A social justice podcast combining hard-hitting journalism and interviews with hip-hop music and original lyrics from independent artists. Each episode delves into an important issue with an alternative take to widely accepted narratives, arming listeners with knowledge and insight they won't hear from mainstream media outlets.

Journalists Katie Herzog and Jesse Singal scour the internet for its craziest, silliest, most sociopathic content, part of an obsessive and ill-conceived attempt to extract kernels of meaning and humanity from a landscape of endless raging dumpster fires. www.blockedandreported.org

He’s the President, yet we’re still trying to answer basic questions about how his business works: What deals are happening, who they’re happening with, and if the President and his family are keeping their promise to separate the Trump Organization from the Trump White House. “Trump, Inc.” is a joint reporting project from WNYC Studios and ProPublica that digs deep into these questions. We’ll be layout out what we know, what we don’t and how you can help us fill in the gaps. WNYC Studios is a listener-supported producer of other leading podcasts, including On the Media, Radiolab, Death, Sex & Money, Here’s the Thing with Alec Baldwin, Nancy and many others. ProPublica is a non-profit investigative newsroom.© WNYC Studios

Across the world people were presented with what appeared to be a heart-breaking but straightforward story of a father and his motherless daughter struggling to get to Britain. But behind those headlines lay a far more sinister truth. BBC Journalist Sue Mitchell and former soldier Rob Lawrie discover that the little girl appears to have simply vanished. Can they find her in time?