Ok, this will take a while to write out. Here we go
Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History. He’s not a professional historian, but he’s very engaging on his narrative style and reads a lot before doing an episode. But still, always take it with a pinch of salt, something may slip by him because he’s not a historian (he’s aware of it and recognises his limits).
Fall of Civilizations. Pretty new one, it’s good for getting an overall picture of a long history.
History of Philosophy Without any Gaps. Counts more like a philosophy podcast, but here we go. It’s done by Peter Adamson, a philosopher from King’s College, London. And it’s really cool that after a few episodes on each philosopher, he interviews an expert on that philosopher, so it is always extremely well informed.
History on Fire. Daniele Bolleli is a historian, but I am not 100% sure about how legit he is. I take this one always with a cautionary pinch of salt, just like Hardcore History. But it is very engaging.
In Our Time: History. Great BBC podcast, basically 30-min interviews with a couple of experts on a random history theme.
NT Pod. It’s a podcast about a historical critical look at the New Testament. It’s done by Mark Goodacre, from Duke University, one of the few scholars that believes that the synoptic problem should be solved without the hypotetical Q.
Pax Britannica. Samuel Hume is a historian who knows what he’s talking about, and he does a pretty good job of telling the history of the British Empire.
History of Rome and Revolutions by Mike Duncan are 2 of the best history podcasts out there. He started with History of Rome, and when finished went on with Revolutions. He’s well informed, and his style is very engaging. Also, he’s studied politics, so his explanations tend to focus on that side of things.
Russian Rulers. It’s done by a historian, it’s well informed, and despite the sound quality in the first episodes it’s worth listening to.
History of English. It’s a cool one, talking about the origins and evolution of the language, and of the people that spoke it. I am learning more than I expected from it.
There are more than I listen to, but these are the ones that I would recommend completely without hesitation. If it is your thing, then, well… enjoy. :)
Thanks! I won’t add these to the top list but I hope people will scroll down to see the comments. I should mention that there are a whole bunch of Mike Duncan—inspired “History of X” which are of varying quality. I wanted to get into the History of China dude, but I couldn’t give him more than a few episodes due to wincing at his accent, didn’t even get to judge his content. Unfortunately my Chinese isn’t actually good enough to listen to podcasts in Chinese about Chinese history. History of Byzantium is supposedly also good.
There is one called China History Podcast that doesn’t have a weird accent issue, the guy sounds completely american.
As for History of Byzantium, it is good on the content but the sound quality is due for an improvement for a long time, it can become difficult to listen sometimes because of that.
Ah you’ve got my directionality confused, the bias preventing me from judging History of China podcast dispassionately is in his inability to pronounce Chinese fluently. I’m in the weird position of being fluent enough in Chinese to be a little intolerant of English speakers with bad Chinese pronunciation but not fluent enough to understand the Chinese-language content. I will say though that China History Podcast seems a little better on this very particular axis and I think it would be unreasonable to expect much better. They definitely seem to have a lot of content, and much of it relevant to the modern era!
Okay, this guy sold me as soon as I saw he had an episode on Doc Ing Hay’s general store in rural Oregon. I stumbled upon this place once just passing through, at a convenient time to get a guided tour of the little museum they’d made out of it. There’s not even a Wikipedia article on it yet; which gives me the impression that this podcaster is committed to both a broad and deep history of the chinese experience
Added AskHistorians podcast! Mentioning Coursera inline.
Ok, this will take a while to write out. Here we go
Dan Carlin’s Hardcore History. He’s not a professional historian, but he’s very engaging on his narrative style and reads a lot before doing an episode. But still, always take it with a pinch of salt, something may slip by him because he’s not a historian (he’s aware of it and recognises his limits).
Fall of Civilizations. Pretty new one, it’s good for getting an overall picture of a long history.
History of Philosophy Without any Gaps. Counts more like a philosophy podcast, but here we go. It’s done by Peter Adamson, a philosopher from King’s College, London. And it’s really cool that after a few episodes on each philosopher, he interviews an expert on that philosopher, so it is always extremely well informed.
History on Fire. Daniele Bolleli is a historian, but I am not 100% sure about how legit he is. I take this one always with a cautionary pinch of salt, just like Hardcore History. But it is very engaging.
In Our Time: History. Great BBC podcast, basically 30-min interviews with a couple of experts on a random history theme.
NT Pod. It’s a podcast about a historical critical look at the New Testament. It’s done by Mark Goodacre, from Duke University, one of the few scholars that believes that the synoptic problem should be solved without the hypotetical Q.
Pax Britannica. Samuel Hume is a historian who knows what he’s talking about, and he does a pretty good job of telling the history of the British Empire.
History of Rome and Revolutions by Mike Duncan are 2 of the best history podcasts out there. He started with History of Rome, and when finished went on with Revolutions. He’s well informed, and his style is very engaging. Also, he’s studied politics, so his explanations tend to focus on that side of things.
Russian Rulers. It’s done by a historian, it’s well informed, and despite the sound quality in the first episodes it’s worth listening to.
History of English. It’s a cool one, talking about the origins and evolution of the language, and of the people that spoke it. I am learning more than I expected from it.
There are more than I listen to, but these are the ones that I would recommend completely without hesitation. If it is your thing, then, well… enjoy. :)
If we are listing quality educational history podcasts then it would be a shame not to mention History of Japan.
Thanks! I won’t add these to the top list but I hope people will scroll down to see the comments. I should mention that there are a whole bunch of Mike Duncan—inspired “History of X” which are of varying quality. I wanted to get into the History of China dude, but I couldn’t give him more than a few episodes due to wincing at his accent, didn’t even get to judge his content. Unfortunately my Chinese isn’t actually good enough to listen to podcasts in Chinese about Chinese history. History of Byzantium is supposedly also good.
There is one called China History Podcast that doesn’t have a weird accent issue, the guy sounds completely american.
As for History of Byzantium, it is good on the content but the sound quality is due for an improvement for a long time, it can become difficult to listen sometimes because of that.
Ah you’ve got my directionality confused, the bias preventing me from judging History of China podcast dispassionately is in his inability to pronounce Chinese fluently. I’m in the weird position of being fluent enough in Chinese to be a little intolerant of English speakers with bad Chinese pronunciation but not fluent enough to understand the Chinese-language content. I will say though that China History Podcast seems a little better on this very particular axis and I think it would be unreasonable to expect much better. They definitely seem to have a lot of content, and much of it relevant to the modern era!
Okay, this guy sold me as soon as I saw he had an episode on Doc Ing Hay’s general store in rural Oregon. I stumbled upon this place once just passing through, at a convenient time to get a guided tour of the little museum they’d made out of it. There’s not even a Wikipedia article on it yet; which gives me the impression that this podcaster is committed to both a broad and deep history of the chinese experience
Oh, I see. Thank you for clarifying, and I hope you enjoy the CHP 🙂
If you are interested in history podcasts, I listen to quite a few of them myself, I will come back with a list of good ones.