Resarch

 TV documentaries first started off in the 1950s-60s where it was still black and white television with formal narration and more educational and public serviced focused. The common topics mentioned in these documentaries were politics, war, science and social issues this impact established documentaries as serious as journalism on television. In the 70s the characteristics of documentaries were more fly on the wall style and there were minimal narration and more long takes. These ones focused more on institutions like hospitals, prisons or police as well as war and politics. The more time went on documentaries became more modernised as colour TV was widely adopted and there were bigger budgets and more cinematic visuals. The topic of documentaries varied from wildlife and nature like David Attenborough's to more emotional focus 'on identity and family life. As we enter the 2000s, they started to become more multi episode bingeable series with high production values and a global audience. Since 2020, media has become more short form clips with influencer involvement as attention spans has worsened over time so they must keep things as upbeat as possible whilst still fitting the theme of the documentary. They have evolved from formal educational broadcasts into more cinematic storytelling's that mix journalism with entertainment. It is predicted that over time documentaries will continue to change and AI will be used widely for transcriptions and subtitles along with other factors. Specifically, is stated the true crime will be the fastest growing genre in TV documentaries.

The demand for documentaries across broadcast and streaming has increased by about 44% making it one of the fastest growing unscripted genres. However, documentary production grew even faster at about 63%, leading to a relative oversupply compared to audience growth – meaning competition for attention is increasing. The global documentary and film market value is sitting at around 13.7 billion dollars and is expected to grow to 23.5 billion USD by 2035 which is an annual growth rate of 5.5%. around 68% of viewers report preferring factual documentaries over fictional content as they seek educational and informative viewing experiences. In the more modern times, streaming platforms now account for about 78% of total documentary viewership. Also, data from 2023 shows that North America released 520 documentaries with just under 2.4 billion viewing hours logged across platforms. On major streaming platforms documentaries make up about 12-16% of all titles offered and research shows that average documentary viewing time per subscriber was around hours and 34 minutes per month, meaning it is increasing year over year.  The gender and audience demographic is quite equal between males and females unlike some reality TV dominated demographics and there is a tendency for older audiences to favour documentaries on broadcast platforms while younger viewers engage more via streaming and mobile platforms. Documentaries are also widely used outside just entertainment like in academic settings thousands of titles are licensed annually for classroom and educational use. Overall, this states that streaming has become the main way people watch documentaries rather than the traditional broadcasting viewing, engagement is increasing annually and global viewership patterns vary by region but overall, the scale is large and growing.

Documentaries are significantly rising in demands in the recent years by roughly 44% between 2021 and 2023. The global documentary TV and film market is suspected to keep growing to around 13.7 billion dollars in 2025 and forecasts to increase annually into the 2030s. Most documentaries benefit from streaming services and platforms like Netflix, YouTube, Prime video and others have dedicated documentary hubs meaning millions more people see these shows than in the traditional TV era. Viewers are drawn to documentaries for several reasons too- people enjoy learning about real world issues like history, nature, crime, culture and science. These make documentaries more appealing than just fictional content. In more recent documentaries they have more elements of drama to them to make them more bingeable and engaging, the same way popular scripted TV is. They also have social and cultural relevance since many documentaries tackle current social or political topics which attract viewers who want deeper insight or context beyond headlines. Despite growth in demand, documentary production has increased even more rapidly in some markets meaning viewer attention may be spread thin across many titles. In some regions documentaries still hold a smaller share of total viewing compared to other genres.  The most popular genre of documentaries are true crime and investigation, following nature and environment. There is no specific target audience for documentaries in general it depends on the type of documentary. For a popular documentary to take success you have to factor in who the target audience for this would be and why it would appeal to them for it to be popular.