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News · Serial Productions & The New York Times

Serial

by Serial Productions & The New York Times

Our newest podcast, “The Last 12 Weeks” is out now. Search for it wherever you get your podcasts. Serial Productions makes narrative podcasts that have transformed the medium. Sign up for our newsletter at nytimes.com/serialnewsletter to find out about new shows, get behind the scenes stories, and see photos and videos you can’t see on a podcast. To get full access to Serial Productions shows, and to other New York Times podcasts on Apple Podcasts and Spotify, subscribe at nytimes.com/podcasts. Have a story pitch, a tip, or feedback on our shows? Email us at serialshows@nytimes.com "Serial" began in 2014 as a spinoff of the public radio show "This American Life." In 2017, we formed Serial Productions when we launched the podcast “S-Town.” Since then, Serial Productions has produced every season of “Serial” along with shows like “Nice White Parents,” “The Trojan Horse Affair,” “The Coldest Case in Laramie,” “The Retrievals” and more. 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.

Chart trend

Position in the overall Apple Podcasts chart (US), last 90 days.

#12
all-time peak
39
days in the top 50 since Nov 2024

Latest episodes

Showing 20 · updated from the feed

The Last 12 Weeks - Ep. 5

Days before the execution, the defense team scrambles to respond to an unexpected ruling, while the lead lawyer makes what may be his final visit to David Wood on death r

Jun 18
39 min

The Last 12 Weeks - Ep. 4

To justify sentencing David Wood to death, prosecutors argued that he was a convicted rapist turned serial killer. And yet, Wood has insisted all along that isn’t true. W

Jun 18
30 min

The Last 12 Weeks - Ep. 3

In the final weeks before the execution date, the defense team has to decide just how far it’s willing to push people to save David Wood’s life. The team’s deliberations

Jun 18
43 min

The Last 12 Weeks - Ep. 2

The way the state constructed the case, there’s no one big shiny piece of evidence for the defense to knock down. Instead, there are a million little threads to pull at.

Jun 18
45 min

The Last 12 Weeks - Ep. 1

In 1992, David Wood became El Paso’s most notorious convicted serial killer. He has been on death row ever since. More than 30 years later, his lawyers have just a few mo

Jun 18
41 min

The Last 12 Weeks - Trailer

In 1992, David Wood was convicted of murdering young women and girls and burying them in the desert outside El Paso. He has been on death row ever since. “The Last 12 Wee

Jun 16
2 min

The Idiot - Chapter 1

For decades, M. simply disliked Allen. They saw him as a fool, a pompous “international businessman” who bragged about shady deals and drove fancy cars while living in Ea

Mar 26
21 min

The Idiot - Trailer

The New York Times writer M. Gessen is widely known for their award-winning writing about totalitarianism, terrorism and the erosion of human rights. Now, M. is examining

Mar 19
1 min

The Preventionist - Ep. 1

The story of how this extraordinary situation in the Lehigh Valley came to light — because it almost didn’t. Hosted by Simplecast, an AdsWizz company. See pcm.adswizz.c

Oct 30 2025
40 min

The Preventionist - Trailer

In the summer of 2023, reporter Dyan Neary received a tip about a problematic doctor in Pennsylvania. Families were claiming that when they sought medical care for their

Oct 16 2025
3 min

The Retrievals S02 - Ep. 1

Clara is a labor and delivery nurse, so she has a pretty good idea of what to expect when she delivers her own twins at the same hospital where she works. But she wasn’t

Aug 7 2025
49 min

The Retrievals S02 - Trailer

C-sections are the most frequently performed major surgeries in the world. So why do so many patients feel severe pain during them? Season 2 of the award-winning podcast

Jul 10 2025
4 min

The Good Whale - Ep. 1

When the movie “Free Willy” is released, word gets out that the star, a killer whale named Keiko, is sick and living in a tiny pool at a Mexican amusement park. An enviro

Jan 2 2025
47 min

The Good Whale - Trailer

After the movie “Free Willy” became a hit, word got out that the star of the film, a killer whale named Keiko, was sick and living in a tiny pool at a Mexican amusement p

Nov 7 2024
2 min

Serial S04 - Ep. 1: Poor Baby Raul

Maybe you have an idea in your head about what it was like to work at Guantánamo, one of the most notorious prisons in the world. Think again. Hosted by Simplecast, an

Mar 28 2024
42 min

Serial S04 - Trailer

From Serial Productions and The New York Times, Serial Season 4 is a history of Guantánamo told by people who lived through key moments in Guantánamo’s evolution, who kno

Mar 21 2024
2 min

The Kids of Rutherford County - Ep. 1

A police officer in Rutherford County, Tenn., sees a video of little kids fighting, and decides to investigate. This leads to the arrest of 11 kids for watching the fight

Nov 16 2023
29 min

The Kids of Rutherford County - Trailer

For over a decade, one Tennessee county arrested and illegally jailed hundreds, maybe thousands, of children. A four-part narrative series reveals how this came to be, th

Oct 19 2023
3 min

The Retrievals S01 - Ep. 1

Patients at a fertility clinic experience excruciating, unexpected pain. For months the reason for that pain remains hidden. Then they get a letter from the clinic. Hos

Aug 17 2023
58 min

The Retrievals S01 - Trailer

The patients in this story came to the Yale Fertility Center to pursue pregnancy. They began their I.V.F. cycles full of expectation and hope. Then a surgical procedure c

Jun 22 2023
4 min

Chart positions

Where Serial ranks today in each Apple Podcasts chart (US, Sep 7, 2026).

#162 ▲ 5 All Podcasts US
#27 ▲ 3 News US

What listeners say

A curated, balanced selection of Apple Podcasts reviews.

Another amazing season (retrievals 2). Such detailed reporting and story telling. It’s so well produced and such an important story!

rubyrose207 · Sep 2025

This was a heartbreaking, but important story regarding pain management and medical malpractice. I understand the paywall is frustrating, but I appreciate the in-depth journalism and it was well worth the knowledge I know have. This was absolutely gut wrenching to listen to, but so important to bring awareness and acknowledge how women's pain is dismissed by doctors time and time again. It absolutely disgusting when one of the patients informed the doctor that they had given her IV solution and not fentanyl they did not investigate nor provide proper pain relief after the fact during an egg retrieval surgery. The doctors and nurses at Yale dehumanize their patients and disregarded their pain along with redirected blame when they failed to report and investigate. Outstanding journalism and cohesive story.

Ell144 · Dec 2024

The story of Keiko and the team of people dedicated to rehabilitating and rewilding him is amazing and utterly absorbing. It contains truly magical moments. Serial has created an indelible character in Keiko.

XY@@60 · Nov 2024

Hard to understand why we needed this many episodes to learn that there is no answer to a cold case. All the tricks of building suspense and teasing the possibility of a reversal of expectations came into play. But it ended with a shrug. Good storytelling doesn’t make up for the lack of a story.

TheIMR · Oct 2024

I loved season four up to episode 8. It felt like the reporter was brushing over that previous detainee’s explicit terrorism that he explained himself. Venturing to say he did some not so great things, but so did we. I don’t believe in how our military & government handles most domestic & global issues like the genocide occurring right now, but this felt dismissive of his choice to try & bomb a civilian area in his 20s & collect money for 9/11. I’m liberal & progressive, and felt aligned with everything up to this point. But this felt like lazy reporting from her end: dismissive, calloused & casual in his introduction. I can see how this would turn some people off to the rest of the season which is a disappointment since the rest was so poignant & informative: more balanced & concise. Prefer Sarah’s reporting.

GigiB011111& · May 2024

I’ve just finished episode 8 of Season 4. In sum, Serial continues to be underwhelming. The first season of Serial was a game changer. A masterpiece. A fascinating, captivating story that was a combination of perfectly balanced journalism and underlying mystery. Each episode slowly pulled back the onion leaving the listener desperate for more and spawning an entire genre of true crime podcasts. Since then, Serial has been disappointing. A profile on a mentally unstable Bowe Bergdahl. A look at the dysfunctional criminal justice system that most lawyers are already very familiar with. And now Guantanamo Bay. I’ll save you a few hours - there are no surprises here. The episodes are well researched, meticulously edited and produced. But ultimately, it’s a story of Guantanamo Bay that has mostly been told. There’s not much here that hasn’t been on the front page of the New York Times. It feels tired and more than that, self indulgent. There are a couple of really jarring moments (the aside about forgives at the end of episode two and the entire rambling episode 7 come to mind). Like a rock band touring years after the founding members have all died, Serial keeps going, but the crowd wants the hits and it’s playing it’s new material, seemingly oblivious as to why the audience bought their tickets.

Rob the lawyer · May 2024

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About Serial on Reason.fm

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