Great podcasts always transport us, but there's something unique about the limited series that inspires an even more ravenous audio binge.
Podcasts are already an ideal storytelling medium, bringing us back to one of humanity's most ancient forms of entertainment through oral traditions. But the constraints of a limited series only enhance those qualities that can make podcasts such transportive, binge-worthy experiences.
With definitive beginnings, middles, and ends, the limited-series podcast as we define it is a contained story told over five or more episodes. Many of those on our list have other seasons tackling different subject matters. But we're highlighting the best of the best.
Evidently, the genres of true crime and documentary dominate the limited-series podcasting category (and the medium as a whole, really). But we've gone out of our way to include entries from many genres, including fiction, history, culture, and comedy.
Whether you're looking to binge while deep cleaning, gaming, taking a bath, commuting, hunkering down for a long flight or road trip, or you just need a distraction, we guarantee these recommendations will do wonders to pass the time.
1. Will Be Wild
What it is or who it's for: An essential breakdown of January 6, featuring a wide range of perspectives from the people who were there in the lead-up, during the attack, and in the thick of its aftermath.
What it's about: The insurrection at the Capitol on January 6, 2021, left many asking the same question: How could this happen? This eight-parter by Pineapple Studios and Wondery does an excellent and deeply compelling job of answering that exact question. Hosts Andrea Bernstein and Ilya Marritz bring a sense of humanity to their coverage of the folks who were closest to the historic attack. Interviews range from the concerned family members who warned the FBI about the potential violence they were hearing about to the government officials who listened and tried to send out alarms about the domestic terror threat to even some Trump supporters who attended the rally. If you think you've heard it all when it comes to this once-in-a-lifetime news story, Will Be Wild will reveal just how much we still need to learn about what happened that day — and what it means for the future of American democracy.
Length: Eight 40- to 45-minute episodes.
2. Root of Evil
What it is or who it's for: A jaw-dropping and uniquely personal investigation into one of the most infamous murders in American history.
What it's about: Despite being a connoisseur of grisly true crime content, I've never encountered anything like Root of Evil before. It left this murder-story aficionado both audibly gasping and uncontrollably weeping. Root of Evil is as much a firsthand account of devastating generational family trauma as it is a riveting investigation into the infamous Black Dahlia murder that rocked Los Angeles in 1947. Sisters Rasha Pecoraro and Yvette Gentile take us along on their journey to unravel the web of fatal lies and horrifying abuses that has haunted their family for decades. At the center of it all is George Hodel; the sisters raise questions about not only his own evil but of what being born into evil means for the innocent people raised by it. Don't worry if you find the first couple episodes hard to follow; it's all part of experiencing this disorienting family saga.
Length: Eight 35- to 60-minute episodes.
3. Rabbit Hole
What it is or who it's for: Anyone who spends time on the internet and wants to understand how tech is fueling IRL cultural and political divides.
What it's about: I know, I know. The Gray Lady hasn't typically been seen as a publication that's especially hip to internet culture. But with Rabbit Hole, host Kevin Roose, a New York Times reporter, paints an impressively comprehensive, complex, clear, and compelling portrait of how online platforms are fueling this era of political and cultural chaos. From the alt-right's rise from the ashes of gamergate to PewDiePie finally going on record about his endless controversies — and even interviews with YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki on the platform's role in radicalizing users — Roose brings all the big guns you'd expect from the Times into his analysis on the digital age. Importantly, the podcast highlights how YouTube has been vital to the misinformation infrastructure, which a lot of post-Capitol coverage of Big Tech underestimated. [Adapted from our Best Podcasts on Misinformation and Conspiracy Theories and Best New Podcasts of 2020 lists]
Length: Seven 30-minute-long episodes
4. Soft Voice
What it is or who it's for: Folks who think fiction podcasts aren't for them but love surrealist mysteries (with a dash of feminist undertones).
What it's about: Whatever you think you can expect from QCODE's Soft Voice fictional podcast, think again. Several episodes in, we're still not entirely sure what's going on, but we know that it's an absolute trip. Featuring a trifecta of British talent you'll probably recognize (Naomi Scott, Olivia Cooke, and Bel Powley), it tells the story of Lydia, who lives what appears to be an ideal life because she always listens to Soft Voice, the controlling little dictator inside her head insisting on perfection and conformity. Then, one day, it's gone. We'll leave it at that, but buckle up for a wild, sapphic, and mind-melting journey best listened to with headphones. Do note the disclaimer in the beginning, which warns of sensitive topics broached that might be triggering to some. [Adapted from our Best New Podcasts of 2021 list]
Length: 10 parts, each about 30 minutes.
5. The Habitat
What it is or who it's for: Those who want to escape to a different planet without getting too far away from home.
What it's about: At its essence, The Habitat is like if NASA did a season of Big Brother. Six contestants (aka volunteers) elect to participate in an experiment where they play the part of a crew of astronauts living on Mars. For a full year, these six strangers share very close quarters while simulating a space mission that's actually stationed on a remote mountain in Hawaii. Host Lynn Levy takes us through their experiences using the audio diaries each had to log daily. It's a mix of existential contemplations and some good-old-fashioned reality TV human drama.
Length: Seven 30-minute episodes (with one bonus episode).
6. Chameleon: Season 1, Hollywood Con Queen
What it is or who it's for: The people living for the scammer era of true crime
What it's about: There's an Anna Delvey-level fraudster out there whose story you probably haven't heard yet but really should. In Season 1 of Chameleon, journalist Josh Dean unravels one of the most elaborate, bizarre, wild, and sometimes even heartbreaking scams preying upon Hollywood's most vulnerable workers. Nicknamed the Hollywood Con Queen, the fake big-time producer that this podcast investigates has tricked countless gig workers like aspiring makeup artists and Hollywood personal trainers into taking nonexistent jobs in Indonesia. While this story contains more bewildering questions than answers, it's full of gripping twists, turns, and examinations of power dynamics embedded into the industry across gender, race, and status. What sets this one apart from so many other scam stories is how money or wealth doesn't seem to be the main goal at all. What this fraudster takes from victims is much more personal than just their cash, robbing them of not only their dignity but also faith in themselves and their dreams.
Length: 10 full-length 30- to 45-minute episodes, with two bonus 30-minute episodes.
7. 1619
What it is or who it's for: Every American.
What it's about: As all-encompassing as it is powerfully specific and personal, 1619 is the story of modern America — and the people who built it through blood, sweat, tears, and hope. It's a version of the story a great many of us never hear, purposefully kept hidden in the margins of U.S. history books. But 1619 isn't just a podcast about the history of slavery as the genesis of almost every aspect of American society and culture today. By weaving the historical with the personal and the poetic, the Pulitzer Prize-winning project by Nikole Hannah-Jones (alongside other guest hosts) paints a viscerally captivating portrait of Black Americans' lived experience — and the simultaneous struggle, strength, oppression, ambition, pain, and humor needed to survive. 1619 is a story about race and the inequalities embedded into a system predicated on its conceit. But above all it's a story about us, the people we were then and still are now.
Length: Six 35- to 45-minute episodes.
8. Harsh Reality: The Story of Miriam Rivera
What it is or who it's for: Reality TV junkies who know that there's much more to early 2000s trash TV than we once thought.
What it's about: You may have missed the 2004 reality TV show There's Something About Miriam — but you cannot miss this Wondery series' deep dive on its impact. The premise of the show was simple and cruel: Six cis male contestants competed for the affections of the gorgeous Miriam Rivera without knowing she was trans, until the producers revealed the information for maximum dramatic effect. An onslaught of abuse toward Miriam followed from the public, media, show contestants, and callous reality TV producers. Just about everyone lost all human dignity in the process, except that is for the ever-glamorous Miriam, who took it all in stride while never losing sight of her dream to become a star.
As the star of the first dating reality TV show centered on a trans woman, Miriam represented a lot of different thing to a lot of different folks. For mainstream heteronormative society, she was their earliest (if not first) intimate exposure to a trans person. In the trans community, she was a double-edged sword of long overdue representation steeped in a world of transphobia. But what podcast host Trace Lysette so artfully does in this series is focus on Miriam not only as a star or pioneering TV personality, but as a human being. Filled with gut-wrenching and sobering confrontations with transmisogyny as much as joyous celebrations of her glamorousness, Harsh Reality is a touching portrait of a woman subjected to some of the worst that exploitative 2000s TV had to offer.
Length: Six 40- to 45-minute episodes, with one bonus episode.
9. This Is Branchburg
What it is or who it's for: Lovers of the strange stylings of sketch comedy like The Tim & Eric Show and I Think You Should Leave with Tim Robinson.
What it's about: This Is Branchburg is an experiment into sketch comedy podcasting from Brendan O’Hare and Cory Snearowski, co-produced by Tim Heidecker (of Tim & Eric fame). Each 15- to 20-minute episode offers various windows into the lives of fictional citizens from a small New Jersey town — like an existential milkman contemplating being the last of his kind and pining for the good old days when people used to respect that the government recommended eight glasses of milk a day. In the same way podcasts like Comedy Bang! Bang! paved a path for improv in comedy podcasting, This Is Branchburg feels like it could do the same for scripted sketch shows.
Length: 20 episodes, each abbout 15- to 20-minutes.
10. Floodlines
What it is or who it's for: Americans seeking to know the truth about one of the most misunderstood national tragedies in our recent history.
What it's about: No matter how much you think you know about Hurricane Katrina, Floodlines reveals that America has only reached the surface of reckoning with this deep national wound. Through interviews with survivors and reporting that addresses the media misinformation and government incompetence around the catastrophe, host Vann R. Newkirk II shows how the storm that devastated New Orleans was part of the same one that's been brewing in America for centuries.
Understanding the forces of systemic racism is at the heart of comprehending what happened, and how the ripple effect of those systems fuels so much of America's past, present, and future. Floodlines was released prior to the country-wide protests ignited by the police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis. But the same issues persist in the news coverage of police brutality and protests against it now. Like Katrina in 2005, many media reports focus on pockets of looting rather than the unconscionable suffering of Black people, with authorities victim-blaming them for their own oppression and the total failure of the government to protect and care about the lives of its own people. [Adapted from our Best New Podcasts of 2020 list]
Length: Eight 30- to 40-minute episodes.
11. Limetown
What it is or who it's for: True crime lovers who think they don't like fiction podcasts.
What it's about: Limetown nails the true crime investigative podcast vibe so thoroughly it's easy to get so immersed you actually start believing this audio drama is real. Fictional reporter Lia Haddock takes you on her perilous journey to get to the bottom of what happened in a small Tennessee town after a mysterious incident years ago caused the sudden disappearance of all 300 of its residents. We won't spoil any more of this horror podcast's gripping plot. But trust us when we say this bit of horror fiction is perfect for those who love true crime but usually struggle to get into fictional podcasts. While a second season released in 2018 (three years after the first one), the original story felt most complete on its own. [Adapted from our Best Podcasts for Horror Fans roundup]
Length: Six 30- to 40-minute episodes, with some brief bonus episodes.
12. The Mystery Show
What it is or who it's for: A delightfully alternative way of seeing the world's (seemingly) unanswerable questions.
What it's about: The antithesis of your typical unsolved mystery or conspiracy podcast, The Mystery Show turns mundane cases of the unexplained into riveting, hilarious, and deeply human radio. This American Life veteran Starlee Kine is a fearless mystery-solver unlike any other, with evidently endless amounts of curiosity and dedication to figuring out the most innocuous unexplained phenomenons that keep her up at night. Sadly, Gimlet canceled the podcast before Season 2 was finished and it remains unclear if it will live again through a different network.
Length: Six 25- to 60-minute episodes.
13. Anything for Selena
What it is or who it's for: While especially close to the heart for Latin Americans, this is a story for anyone interested in understanding the melting pot that this nation represents.
What it's about: Anything for Selena isn't just about the beloved Mexican-American singer who was tragically murdered at the height of her career. Like Selena's music, this podcast touches on the beating heart of Latin-American identity itself. Host Maria Garcia combines the cultural context behind Selena's significance to the community with her own personal narrative, seeking to understand more about herself through the pop star who helped many who straddle a multicultural background feel so seen. As intimate as it is all-encompassing, the nine-part series offers both an English and Spanish version of each episode. [From our Best New Podcasts of 2021 list]
Length: Nine 45-minute episodes, with two bonus episodes.
14. Broken Harts
What it is or who it's for: An unimaginable, fatal tragedy peeled back like layers of an onion to reveal the larger social ills at play.
What it's about: In 2018, a car carrying the six adopted Black children of a white lesbian couple was found crashed at the bottom of a cliff on California Highway 1. None of the Hart family, including the adoptive parents, survived. If that story sounds vaguely familiar, you probably watched the fictionalized version of it that was the basis for Atlanta Season 5's premiere episode. By unraveling the events and people that lead to what was later deemed a murder-suicide, the podcast digs into an array of complicated and important social issues we face today. It depicts the very real human cost of too often abstracted problems, like identity politics, virtue signaling, America's broken foster care system, underreported domestic abuse in LGBTQ relationships, and even the pretty lies we tell on social media to cover it all up.
Length: Nine 30- to 45-minute episodes.
15. 9/12
What it is or who it's for: Anyone interested in one of the biggest cultural shifts in American society in recent memory.
What it's about: Despite the ominous promise to "never forget," it’s hard to remember exactly how much 9/11 changed the U.S. That’s what Pineapple Street Studios’ 9/12 is all about, as host Dan Taberski examines all the new realities people found themselves in after the attacks. From The Onion’s struggle to recalibrate what humor meant post-9/11 to the long-lasting explosion of Islamophobia that traumatized so many in America, there are plenty of things we need to remember about the post-9/11 decades we’re still going through now. But what matters more than anything is rethinking and re-processing the nationalistic narratives we were fed for decades. [Adapted from our Best New Podcasts of 2021 list]
Length: Seven 30-45 minute episodes, with a couple bonus episodes.
16. You Must Remember This: Charles Manson's Hollywood
What it is and who it's for: For those who think they know everything about the Manson murders but are missing the fascinating Hollywood history at its center.
What it's about: We've seen so many different iterations of the infamous 1969 Manson murders, from the countless movie and TV adaptations to a litany of true crime documentaries and books. But with all due respect to Once Upon a Time in Hollywood, it's this 12-part podcast series that offers one of the most refreshingly unique and revealing takes on Charles Manson. Host Karina Longworth uses her unmatched storytelling and journalistic skills to tell the story of the Manson Family through the perspective of Hollywood history. Cutting through all the monster mythologizing and aggrandizing bullshit, Longworth gets to the truth of Manson as a fame-hungry grifter with middling musical talents. What's more damning, she dives into the California music scene whose stars — like Beach Boy Dennis Wilson — were foolish enough to invite him in. More than just a portrait of the man, You Must Remember This gets at the unique cultural circumstances behind the tragedy and its long-lasting impact on the glitz and glamour of seemingly untouchable stardom.
Length: Twelve 35- to 60-minute episodes.
17. Missing & Murdered: Finding Cleo
What it is or who it's for: Exposing the disproportionate under-reported crimes and injustices committed against Indigenous women.
What it's about: Missing & Murdered threads the line between the deeply personal and the all-encompassing. Each season, CBC reporter Connie Walker (a First Nation woman herself) investigates the case of a missing or murdered indigenous woman in Ontario, Canada. But each victim unearths a chasm of family and generational trauma, historic injustices with viscerally ongoing systemic repercussions, and an entire continent's refusal to reckon with the victims they'd rather forget. Both seasons are phenomenal. But the second season's hunt to find Cleo Semaganis Nicotine — a young girl murdered in the 1970s, her biological family was told — crystallized the podcast as one of the greatest. Missing & Murdered ultimately reveals how the blood is on the hands of all who continue to benefit from the deaths of First Nation people to this day while ignoring the untold suffering of those who survived it. [From our Best True Crime Podcasts of All Time list]
Length: Eight 35- to 60-minute episodes, with a couple bonus episodes.
18. Dr. Death Season 3: Miracle Man
What it is or who it's for: A unique cross between true crime and medical scandal.
What it's about: When it comes to serial killers, we've grown accustomed to straightforward tales of bogeymen who hunt their victims through methods that feel totally removed from everyday life and society. But Dr. Death is a series that explores how those tasked with saving lives can wind up taking away more lives than those infamous criminals. While every season of the show hosted by Laura Beil is gripping, Miracle Man is one of the most riveting. It begins with the too-good-to-be-true love story between an NBC reporter and a world-renowned surgeon making unbelievable breakthroughs in medicine. What follows is a wild, twisted story that reveals the human cost of a man who not only wants to play God with patients' lives, but who is seductive enough to fool so many others into believing his myths.
Length: Six 35- to 45-minute episodes, with a couple bonus episodes.
19. A Very Fatal Murder
What it is or who it's for: A must-listen true-crime parody podcast from Onion Public Radio, perfect for crime and comedy aficionados alike.
What it's about: Jumping on the true-crime podcast success bandwagon (some of which we've covered here), A Very Fatal Murder is a pitch-perfect satire of the phenomenon. This Onion podcast goes after everyone — from self-aggrandizing cold-case solvers like Up and Vanished's Payne Lindsey to the sometimes overwrought Bigger Picture Cultural Analysis popularized by Serial and S-Town and, above all, the deeply uncomfortable question of victim exploitation embedded in our obsession with true crime. Like an audio version of Netflix's similarly brilliant American Vandal, A Very Fatal Murder is a hilarious yet necessarily harsh look in the mirror.
Length: Seven 10- to 15-minute episodes. There is a Season 2 fake-out of sorts, but it's basically just a parody on the phenomenon of second season, born out of nothing but the first story's success.
20. Last Podcast on the Left: JFK Mini-Series
What it is or who it's for: Those who've been pulled into the JFK conspiracy theories, or wish to understand the origins of modern conspiracy theory culture.
What it's about: Last Podcast on the Left outdid itself with this deep dive into the 1963 JFK assassination. The five-parter will surely go down as a definitive source on the details, facts, and countless conspiracy theories born from the event — and also includes what they believe to be the most compelling theory about what really happened. It’s an especially poignant topic right now, too, getting into the psychology of why people love conspiracy theories and why the real answers are often far less satisfying than any of that.
Last Podcast on the Left is made up of a ragtag team of comedians who became true crime podcasting monoliths by doing heavily researched deep dives into all things serial killers, cults, conspiracies, and the "spooky gooky." They enjoy covering true crime with a cavalier tone that often veers into flat-out revolting gross-out humor, which either is or is not for you. Admittedly an acquired taste, Last Podcast on the Left goes places few other true crime podcasts would touch with a 10-foot pole (maybe for good reason) — and they've been doing it for longer than really anyone else on this list. While you shouldn't take anything hosts Henry Zebrowski, Ben Kissel, or Marcus Parks say too seriously, they take their jobs very seriously with their own brand of rigor.
[Adapted from our Best True Crime Podcasts of All Time and Best New Podcasts of 2020 list]
Length: Five episodes that are about one to two hours each.
21. The Gateway: Teal Swan
What it is or who it's for: A chilling deep dive into the terrifying power of a figure who some are calling the first YouTube cult leader.
What it's about: Though this podcast was released in 2018, it was a canary in the coal mine spotlighting the ever-thinning line between influencers with online "followings" and cult leaders with dangerously devoted followers. The investigative Gizmodo miniseries reveals the sinister side of Teal Swan, a YouTube wellness guru who has admitted to algorithmically targeting people at their lowest point of suicidal ideation — only to push her personal ideology that, far from discouraging suicide, sometimes even encourages it. While Swan's story continues beyond what this six-parter covers (her following has only grown since), it's an essential listen for understanding the grey area between online spirituality and dangerous misinformation.
Length: Six 35- to 40-minute episodes.
Honorable mentions (or obvious givens)
UPDATE: May. 16, 2022, 6:10 p.m. EDT This post was originally published in April 2020 and updated in May 2022.
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