How many Doctor Who episodes are there? How long would it take to watch every classic and New Who story

Doctor Who became a pop culture phenomenon following its debut on the BBC on November 23 1963. It was the biggest thing to happen to the world since JFK’s assassination the day before.

With the 60th anniversary specials of Doctor Who now airing ahead of a Christmas episode starring Ncuti Gatwa, now is the perfect time to revisit the show’s back catalogue.

But you better get a move on if you want to binge watch the full series before Christmas Day, because it will take you hundreds of hours to get through.

How many episodes of Doctor Who are there?

At time of writing (November 28) 872 episodes of Doctor Who have aired across the original series which ran from 1963-1989, the 1996 TV movie special, and the rebooted series which began in 2005. This makes the show the biggest sci-fi series of all time by episode count.

There were 694 episodes in the original series plus the 30th anniversary special, The Five Doctors. The 4th Doctor, played by Tom Baker has had the longest screen run, appearing in 172 episodes, whilst Paul McGann’s 8th Doctor only featured in the 1996 film, and a preview to the 50th anniversary special.

New Who (the rebooted series) is mostly episodic, with episodes lasting around 45 minutes, almost twice as long as the original show which was made up of serials of several 25 minute episodes. The reboot has so far aired 153 regular episodes and 24 specials, with more to come.

There are two more 60th anniversary specials coming out this week, followed by a Christmas Day special episode starring Ncuti Gatwa as the 15th Doctor. In 2024 the 14th series of New Who will air, with eight episodes in the series. The show has so far been confirmed up to season 17, so that episode list will only get longer.

How long does it take to watch every Doctor Who episode?

If you wanted to take on the greatest binge-watching challenge of all time and watch every episode of Doctor Who, original and reboot, it would take you 17 days, 23 hours, and 54 minutes, without bathroom breaks.

Unfortunately, it’s not actually possible to watch every single episode of Doctor Who, as 97 episodes are missing because the BBC did not begin archiving them until the late 1970s. The sound recordings still exist for these episodes and the BBC has made animated recreations of 77 of them synced to the original sound, leaving 20 episodes unavailable.

Where can you watch every episode of Doctor Who?

You can watch every episode of Doctor Who, except for the first four episode serial An Unearthly Child (which is unavailable due to a licensing issue), on BBC iPlayer now. This includes the original seasons, the animated recreations, the 1996 TV movie, the rebooted series, and all the specials.

An Unearthly Child, and all the other classic episodes and some of the animated episodes, are available on Britbox and ITVX premium.