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The 20 Best Science Documentaries of All Time

By YPB Team

From cosmic voyages and ocean deeps to melting glaciers and the hunt for the Higgs boson, these films turned hard science into unforgettable spectacle. Which one blew your mind? Cast your vote!

  1. Cosmos: A Personal Voyage — ranked #11
    Cosmos: A Personal Voyage
    Carl Sagan's landmark 1980 PBS series exploring the universe and humanity's place within it.
    1000pts
  2. Planet Earth — ranked #22
    Planet Earth
    BBC's 2006 David Attenborough series that redefined nature filmmaking with high-definition footage of Earth's wildest places.
    832pts
  3. My Octopus Teacher — ranked #33
    My Octopus Teacher
    The 2020 Academy Award winner about a filmmaker's year-long bond with a wild octopus.
    832pts
  4. Chasing Coral — ranked #44
    Chasing Coral
    The 2017 Netflix documentary capturing the alarming disappearance of the world's coral reefs.
    680pts
  5. The Blue Planet — ranked #55
    The Blue Planet
    BBC's 2001 landmark exploration of the world's oceans narrated by David Attenborough.
    611pts
  6. Chasing Ice — ranked #66
    Chasing Ice
    The 2012 film following photographer James Balog as he documents rapidly melting glaciers.
    611pts
  7. A Brief History of Time — ranked #77
    A Brief History of Time
    Errol Morris's 1991 documentary on the life and cosmology of Stephen Hawking.
    529pts
  8. Particle Fever — ranked #88
    Particle Fever
    The 2013 film chronicling the Large Hadron Collider's search for the Higgs boson.
    529pts
  9. Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey — ranked #99
    Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey
    Neil deGrasse Tyson's 2014 reboot of Sagan's series, blending astrophysics with sweeping visuals.
    529pts
  10. Life — ranked #1010
    Life
    The 2009 BBC series documenting the extraordinary survival strategies of living things across the planet.
    529pts
  11. The Elegant Universe — ranked #1111
    The Elegant Universe
    The 2003 NOVA series in which physicist Brian Greene explains string theory for a general audience.
    433pts
  12. Blue Planet II — ranked #1212
    Blue Planet II
    The 2017 follow-up praised as one of the greatest nature series the BBC has ever produced.
    433pts
  13. Our Planet — ranked #1313
    Our Planet
    The 2019 Netflix series pairing Attenborough's narration with an urgent conservation message.
    433pts
  14. Planet Earth II — ranked #1414
    Planet Earth II
    The 2016 sequel that pushed camera technology further to capture animal behavior in stunning intimacy.
    317pts
  15. An Inconvenient Truth — ranked #1515
    An Inconvenient Truth
    Al Gore's 2006 Oscar-winning film that brought climate change to a mass audience.
    317pts
  16. March of the Penguins — ranked #1616
    March of the Penguins
    The 2005 Oscar-winning documentary following emperor penguins' grueling Antarctic breeding journey.
    317pts
  17. Apollo 11 — ranked #1717
    Apollo 11
    The 2019 documentary built entirely from restored archival footage of the first Moon landing.
    317pts
  18. Racing Extinction — ranked #1818
    Racing Extinction
    The 2015 documentary exposing the human-driven mass extinction of species.
    0pts
  19. Fantastic Fungi — ranked #1919
    Fantastic Fungi
    The 2019 time-lapse exploration of the hidden world of mushrooms and mycelial networks.
    0pts
  20. The Farthest — ranked #2020
    The Farthest
    The 2017 documentary telling the story of NASA's Voyager interstellar spacecraft.
    0pts
nature50science31documentary11space17

Comments 1

Cut entirely from footage nobody had watched in fifty years, with no presenter anywhere in it: https://youpick.best/articles/apollo-program-ranked-many-ways

YP
ypb-teamAug 25
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