BBC Doctor Who audio stories

The BBC have produced a range of different Doctor Who audio stories over the years.

Initial use of the audio format was sporadic, with the BBC themselves releasing just five Doctor Who radio plays in the 20th century. In 1999, Big Finish Productions were granted the license to produce Doctor Who audio drama, use of the medium finally took off. During this time, the BBC has produced two series of audio drama of their own, namely The Nest Cottage Chronicles (2009-2011) and Redacted. (2022-2023)

The BBC did not involve themselves in original narrated Doctor Who audio stories until 1998, with the release of several anthologies associated with their Short Trips series. Since 2008, BBC Audio has produced a consistent series of narrated audio, featuring current Doctors from 2008-2017 and past Doctors from 2018 onwards.

The Nest Cottage Chronicles
Between 2009 and 2011, AudioGo produced three five-episode series later grouped under the umbrella of The Nest Cottage Chronicles. These were Hornets' Nest, Demon Quest and Serpent Crest. Each story was written by Paul Magrs and saw Tom Baker returning as the Fourth Doctor for the first time in performed media since his regeneration in Logopolis. The series also starred Susan Jameson as Mrs Wibbsey and Richard Franklin as Mike Yates.

Redacted
In 2022, Redacted was released as a ten-episode podcast on BBC Sounds. A second series of six episodes was released in 2023. Series 1 was produced by Ella Watts while James Goss produced Series 2 (Redacted). Juno Dawson acted as head writer for both series. Based around a trio of original characters, the series starred Charlie Craggs, Lois Chimimba and Holly Quin-Ankrah as Cleo Proctor, Abby McPhail and Shawna Thompson respectively. The series stayed close to its Doctor Who roots, however, featuring a range of characters and concepts from the televised series, including appearances by Jodie Whittaker as the Thirteenth Doctor in Series 1.

Audio novelisations
A short audio-novelisation of State of Decay was published by Pickwick International in 1981. Later, AudioGo (later BBC Audio) released three original-to-audio novelisations of their own. These would later be published in the revived Target novelisation range. In addition,, almost every Target novelisation has been released by BBC Audio in audiobook form. See Audiobooks of novelisations for more information.

Short Trips
In 1998, three collections of narrated audio stories associated with the BBC's Short Trips series were released. Six stories in these releases were original-to-audio and are presented below. Three of these would shortly after be published in written form.

New Series Adventures
From 2008-2017, BBC Audio released 31 narrated audio stories featuring then incumbent Doctors, including the Tenth, Eleventh and Twelfth Doctors. These were part of the New Series Adventures line.

Single releases
From 2018, BBC Audio transitioned to releasing stories featuring past Doctors instead.