The Best True Crime Podcasts Of 2022

All good things begin somewhere, and for the true-crime podcast genre it was "Serial," as reported by The Guardian. With over 420 million downloads since its inception in 2014, according to The Podcast Academy, "Serial" has a loyal following — and it is still going strong in 2022, with over a dozen episodes released that year. Furthermore, in addition to winning a 2014 Peabody Award, in March 2022 the creators of "Serial" — Sarah Koenig and Julie Snyder — accepted the Governors Award from The Podcast Academy, which recognized the groundbreaking influence of "Serial" on the industry.

What made "Serial" so addictive in the first place was partly down to the humble honesty — and skillful composition — of the narrator Koenig: She admitted to being no expert from the very start and also changed her mind repeatedly as the season progressed and new information was introduced, as described by The Guardian.

Koenig brings the audience along with her as the investigation progresses, leaving nothing off the table — including errors made by the professionals. This approach not only earnt Koenig a place among Time's 2015 list of most influential people but may have contributed to the freeing of a man wrongfully convicted of murder at the turn of the 21st century. The first season focused on the murder of Hae Min Lee and the subsequent conviction of Adnan Syed, and the viral popularity of "Serial" drew enormous attention to Syed's case, which was found to be less than watertight. Eventually, Syed was freed in 2022 and his murder conviction vacated (via AP).

Winner of no less than four categories of Peoples Choice Podcast Awards in 2022, "Real Life Real Crime" has been attracting accolades since 2019 (via EIN Presswire), when host Woody Overton turned his attention to the unsolved murder of young Courtney Coco, who was killed in Louisiana, per NBC.

Overton's extensive law enforcement background and prior experience with cold cases combine with a natural gift for story-telling, as well as an intuitive ability to recruit his audience to help solve cold cases such as Coco's. Knowing the reluctance of the public to come forward with information, Overton turns to crowd-sourcing leads from his fans, described by some as cult-like, per EIN Presswire. Thanks to Overton and his fans, not only was Coco's murderer brought to justice in 2021, but another murder was subsequently cracked with leads from "Real Life Real Crime."

As reported by WBRZ, in January 2022, Gerald Pourciau Jr. was arrested for the brutal slaying of his wife, Mary Pourciau, and eventually pled guilty several months later. The arrest of the killer occurred barely a month after Overton brought it before his scrutiny on "Real Life Real Crime," which appeared to put pressure on the authorities to further pursue the case.

Criminal activity takes many forms, and so-called white-collar crimes can be just as devastating to their victims as more traditionally bloody examples. But how about one that also involves blood — and lots of it? Enter the quixotic and master-manipulator Elizabeth Holmes, former chief and founder of Theranos, and her audacious billion-dollar fraud, covered skillfully by ABC's podcast series "The Dropout," as reported by The Verge.

Winner of the 2022 Webby Award for crime and justice podcasts, "The Dropout" began in 2019, after Holmes was indicted for a vast fraud centering around new blood testing technology — whose abilities were grossly overstated to investors. 

With access to deposition tapes previously unseen by the public, the host and reporter Rebecca Jarvis peels away the many layers of this extraordinary tale with journalistic rigor. And in 2022, the case reached its final chapter — the verdict, which was covered by "The Dropout" in early January 2022 (per Apple). The podcast is not all about the villain, though: As Jarvis explained to The Verge, there is a serious focus on how and why anyone went along with the deception in the first place.

When it won 2022's best true crime podcast in The Ambies, "Suspect" was barely done with its first season, per Apple. Hosted by Matthew Shaer and Eric Benson, "Suspect" first tackled the murder of Arpana Jinaga, which occurred in Redmond, Washington, in 2008, with no witnesses.

As described by Stylist, the story begins with a foreshadowing event — a Halloween party — followed by the discovery of the murdered 24-year-old Jinaga the morning after. With only forensic and circumstantial evidence to go by, "Suspect" follows the investigation and its many twists and turns, including the authorities' choice of prime suspect with no clear evidence: Emanuel Fair, who also happened to be the only Black man there, per Vulture (who also called it the best podcast of 2021).

The series swirls through an extensive list of gathered evidence that the case involved, including a psychic, and casts a critical eye over it all. Season 2 of "Suspect," which began in the latter half of 2022, examines the case of 12-year-old Jonelle Matthews, who disappeared in 1984 and whose remains were eventually found by accident in 2019, as reported by CBS.

On its seventh season as of 2022 (per Apple), the man behind the true-crime podcast "Someone Knows Something," David Rigden, brings some serious production chops to the genre.

Prior to entering the podcast arena in 2016, he had been nominated for a Canadian Screen Award for best editorial research three years earlier, and in 2008 was nominated for an Emmy for outstanding investigative journalism. The latter was for his work on the documentary "Mississippi Cold Case," which brought attention to the 1964 murders of Charles Moore and Henry Dee — and the subsequent conviction of their killer in 2007, as reported by CBC.

With these credentials, Ridgen can afford to carve out his own brand of true crime narratives — indeed, as he told NowToronto in a 2016 interview, he made it a point not to follow the example of other successful podcasts such as "Serial." Inspiration is drawn instead from his own experiences, including his small-town rural upbringing in the Ottawa Valley, Canada, where some of his early episodes were based.

By the second quarter of 2022, according to Edison Research, "Crime Junkie" was the second most listened-to podcast in the U.S. over the preceding 12 months. This was a ranking of all podcasts, of all types: "Crime Junkie" was only beaten by "The Joe Rogan Experience." And in December 2022, Apple Podcasts placed the true-crime podcast at number one for those most listened to (via Variety). This popularity goes back to its debut in 2017 — created and hosted by Ashley Flowers and Brit Prawat, the two decided to take a less-than-journalistic approach to true crime story-telling, as reported by Indianapolis Monthly.

Indeed, both Flowers and Prawat are open about their casual narrative. The podcast rarely involves the kind of material — such as interviews — found in other popular true crime podcasts, with Flowers once admitting that her research usually begins the same way many people find recipes: searching Google. However, this laissez-faire attitude has landed them in hot water with other true crime reporters, with multiple accusations of plagiarism leveled in their direction, as reported by The New York Times.

This negative publicity has not dented the success of "Crime Junkie," though, with 2022 bringing not only sky-high popularity, but multiple awards too. That year, the 2022 iHeartRadio Podcast awards judged "Crime Junkie" to be both the best crime podcast and overall best podcast of the year.

A new kid on the block for true crime podcasts, having debuted in 2022 (via Apple), but one that has quickly proven its worth: "Proof" made headlines just nine months after its first episode aired. 

Presented by journalists Jacinda Davis and Susan Simpson, the podcast picked up the 1996 death of Brian Bowling, a teenager who was fatally shot at his home in Floyd County, Georgia, as related by Z100 New York. Over the course of 13 episodes, "Proof" went to work excoriating a deeply flawed investigation, which lacked timely witness statements, saw witness coercion (per The Guardian), blamed a gang that may not have even existed, and involved one particular law enforcement officer who was later fired over allegations of sexual assault, as reported by the Rome News-Tribune.

As revealed by "Proof," the two men who were tried for the alleged murder, Darrell Lee Clark and Cain Joshua Storey, were tried and convicted for Bowling's death — partly on the prosecutor's plea to the jury to send a message to other gangs. Davis and Simpson found through their own detective work that two of the star witnesses in the trial were entirely discreditable: One had lied after being threatened by police, and the other had actually testified to a completely different crime. As a result of the revelations made in "Proof," the case was reopened, and as reported by The New York Times in December 2022, both Clark and Storey were freed after 25 years of incarceration.