The 25 Best Documentaries Of 2025

We take a final look back at the year and choose our favorite 25 doc releases.

If there was one prominent theme for documentaries in 2025, it was the importance of journalists. Not just the professionals, but the citizen-activist variety as well. Also, several documentaries this year proved that some stories are adequately covered only thanks to the convenience of cell phones and body cams in war zones, prisons, and other dangerous locations (such as Florida) today.

As we saw with this year’s Critics Choice Documentary Awards nominees, many of the best documentaries of 2025 depended on found footage rather than original material. At a time when images are becoming less and less trustworthy, that trend may not continue, or maybe it needs to, so that filmmakers can help with verifying, mediating, and interpreting these images.

Anyway, I’m not here to make guesses about the future of documentary. I’m here to look back at the past 12 months of documentary releases. Below are my picks for the 25 best documentaries of the year. These are the films and series I haven’t been able to stop thinking about and won’t anytime soon. A few titles included in past drafts of this list have fallen off, so check back on our midyear version for more.

25. Natchez

We had to wait seven years for a sophomore feature from Suzannah Herbert, and I hope this one won’t go as underappreciated as her 2018 underdog sports documentary, Wrestle (co-directed by Lauren Belfer). Natchez is a film that hits differently, more cerebrally than empathically. What starts seemingly as a curious look at one Mississippi town’s legacy regarding slavery winds up as a deeper exploration of how history should be represented, especially when it comes to humanity’s mistakes.

By the end of this uniquely photographed documentary, Natchez’s past is anything but a black or white issue (or, not just a black and white issue, if we’re talking race) as Herbert bursts bubbles filled with expectations and stereotypes. Its pacing and character elements reminded me of Lance Oppenheim’s documentaries, while its attitude and approach make it a good pairing with Donal Mosher and Michael Palmieri‘s The Gospel of Eureka. Yet I found it more thought-provoking and resonant, maybe because I have a complicated personal relationship with the South that has become even more complex since I moved here. I’d love to watch it with my neighbors.

Natchez (which had an awards-qualifying run last month) officially opens theatrically on January 30, 2026.

24. Gold & Greed: The Hunt For Fenn’s Treasure

Chronicling a story that’s like a real-life It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World (with a touch of Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory), Gold & Greed: The Hunt for Fenn’s Treasure was the first truly addictive binge of the year, as far as docuseries go. Across three episodes, it recaps the search for and eventual discovery of a chest of gold and gems hidden in the Rocky Mountains by a wealthy art dealer. The series is full of mystery, adventure, and heart, and despite having an open-and-shut narrative, there are still enough vague and continuing bits to leave viewers with much to ponder and discuss.

Beyond just being a riveting yarn, Gold & Greed excels in the portrayal of its varied characters (also like It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World). The docuseries highlights a handful of players in the game, plus the titular gamemaster, Forrest Fenn, and treats them all with respect as it shares their complete arcs. They all provide, rather than are used for, genuinely intriguing, emotional, amusing, and/or incredible moments. It’s the most purely entertaining docuseries released this year.

Gold & Greed: The Hunt for Fenn’s Treasure is streaming on Netflix.

23. Hung Up On A Dream: The Zombies Documentary

This was a great year for music documentaries, with a few more to come on this list. The top-grossing documentary of the year so far, Becoming Led Zeppelin, would be represented here if I included a few more entries. It’s an impressive work, if not as original as others ranked higher. Take Hung Up On a Dream: The Zombies Documentary as an example of one that took me by surprise. Directed by Robert Schwartzman (yet another Coppola family member making films; he also produced the number 10 pick below), this documentary is partly behind the music and partly, and more compellingly, kind of a lengthy epilogue to one band’s heyday.

Due to its most affecting element, the post-fame life of The Zombies singer Colin Blunstone, Hung Up on a Dream does for vocalists what Hit So Hard: The Life and Near Death of Patty Schemel does for drummers. Singers are at least often frontpersons for their groups, but especially if they’re not songwriters, they can be expendable components. Becoming Led Zeppelin gets into the strange identity of vocalists as well, though only in the pre-Led Zeppelin years. I could see members of Led Zeppelin having a similar post-existence had they disbanded early on, as The Zombies did. Regarding this documentary, it warmed my heart in its showcase of Blunstone and the other band members, who still get along beautifully decades after initially breaking up.

Hung Up on a Dream: The Zombies Documentary is available to rent digitally.

22. Hurricane Katrina: Race Against Time

Despite having one of the worst titles of the year, Hurricane Katrina: Race Against Time managed to stand out among this year’s obligatory nostalgia-driven anniversary-targeting histories. Not just compared to the plethora of other Katrina-focused films and series, but also above fellow National Geographic releases, particularly those in the consistently commendable One Day in America franchise (of which Oklahoma City Bombing: One Day in America deserves an honorable mention here).

Directed by Oscar-nominated filmmaker Traci Curry (Attica), this five-part documentary devotes a brief amount of time to the natural aspect of the disaster in relation to the broader story of Katrina’s immediate and long-term aftermath. It’s not just a look back at events of 20 years ago. It’s a warning for today, and while not necessarily serendipitous or surprising, the series turned out to be more relevant than perhaps intended, given the governmental gutting happening at the time of its release. That it never feels preachy, thanks in part to its interest in personal stories rather than analytical hindsight, is as laudable as is its impeccable storytelling.

Hurricane Katrina: Race Against Time is available to stream on Hulu and Disney+.

21. Caterpillar

A few of my favorite documentaries of the year come across as almost too neatly narrativized to trust as nonfiction. Most of these are character-driven works, like Liza Mandelup’s Caterpillar, which is odd since usually these types of documentaries are more open-ended, as is life. Still, some situations are predictable going in. That’s the case with this film’s premise involving a risky cosmetic medical procedure. It doesn’t make their stories any less compelling, however, maybe since it makes their participants even more intriguing as subjects.

The film follows one man’s pursuit of beauty and confidence through physical change, specifically the permanent alteration of his eye color. Mandelup documents his life beforehand, his trip to India to have the procedure done, and his life afterward, including the pros and cons of his metamorphosis. It’s a sad story on the surface level and even sadder with the consideration that David, the character at the center of Caterpillar, is not uncommon in his desire to become a butterfly in this personal-image-driven era of social media culture.

Caterpillar is available to rent digitally.