List of people from the real world that appeared in Doctor Who

The following is a list of people from the real world that appeared in Doctor Who, or any of its spin-offs, including historical figures and people who played themselves.

The first historical figure to appear in Doctor Who is a Venetian explorer Marco Polo, in appropriately named story Marco Polo (1964). Doctor Who of the 1960s introduced these characters in "pure historical" stories, where they never encountered anything extraterrestrial, besides the Doctor and his companions. The first example of a "pseudo historical" can be found in The Chase (1965), where the crew of the Mary Celeste encounters the Daleks. Such stories became common since Doctor Who's revival in 2005.

The first person to play themselves in Doctor Who was Kenneth Kendall, a newsreader in The War Machines (1966). Another newsreader, Jason Mohammad, holds the record for the most appearances in television media of any real world personality.

The Gunfighters (1966), The Myth Makers (1965) and The Haunting of Villa Diodati (2020) have the record number of historical figure appearances - 11, 9 and 8, respectively.