CELEBRATING 10 YEAR'S OF DAN SNOW'S HISTORY HIT.
OVER 10 MILLION MONTHLY LISTENS ACROSS ALL PODCASTS
1.6 MILLION YOUTUBE SUBSCRIBERS
1250+ ORIGINAL DOCUMENTARIES
Dan Snow’s History Hit podcast turned 10 this year (OMG - double digits!). Huge congratulations to Dan and the entire History Hit team.
A lot has happened in the media and digital landscape since History Hit’s inception 10 years ago: the exponential growth of podcasting, the gradual decline of traditional broadcast TV and audiences’ ever-growing love of history. Sandwiched in between all of this is Dan and the other History Hit talent seizing the opportunity to bring historical stories to audiences in new ways. From a single podcast idea to an award-winning global content network, Dan saw the seismic changes for broadcast and wrote a whole new chapter on his own terms.
The Beginning of History Hit
In Dan’s early career, he was a regular face on British television, frequently fronting history programs and documentaries for major broadcast TV channels.
In 2015, however, he felt the landscape was shifting. TV commissioners were becoming more risk-averse whilst their budgets were being squeezed. Ultimately, this limited the types of stories Dan could get green-lit, and these never felt exciting or nuanced.
Dan decided to make a pivot to the new frontier and launched History Hit: a digital-first brand built to bring untold stories of history to the fore. Most excitingly for Dan, self-commissioning allowed him to seek out the stories that he wanted to tell, delving deep into a wide variety of topics, informed by the current political and cultural landscape.
Objectives
Driven by Dan's passion to reach wider audiences and share narratives often overlooked by traditional broadcasters, History Hit was born.
As television studios faced tightening budgets, History Hit allowed Dan to explain historical stories on his own terms. The initial goals for the podcast were to:
OFFER A DIVERSE ARRAY OF EPISODES THAT TRANSPORT LISTENERS TO SIGNIFICANT HISTORICAL DISCOVERY SITES
DELIVER EXPERT PERSPECTIVES ON CONTEMPORARY GLOBAL ISSUES
IGNITE A PASSION FOR HISTORY IN BOTH EXISTING AND NEW AUDIENCES
Most importantly, Dan wanted to provide a place where history lovers can hear from world-renowned experts, who are given the time and space to get to the heart of a story.
The Turning Point
In the beginning, the move from broadcast to digital was met with scepticism, even within Dan’s inner circle of former television colleagues. “It felt tawdry”, Dan admits, compared to his television pedigree. Trying to sell subscriptions through his Facebook and Twitter accounts, he wasn’t sure whether the dream to go digital would pay off.
However, Dan’s determination to deliver historical stories with depth, nuance and passionate storytelling only made it more clear that audiences craved history that matched current headlines, tackled taboo topics and allowed for complexity.
Fast forward 10 years, and History Hit has flourished into a premium entertainment network of eight podcast series including The Ancients, Gone Medieval, Not Just the Tudors, Betwixt the Sheets, American History Hit, Echoes of History and After Dark, a YouTube channel with over 1.6 million subscribers, a FAST channel, an SVOD service and has picked up prestigious industry awards including three Broadcast Awards, including Best Factual Channel in 2025 and Best Specialist Channel in 2023 and 2024. The company covers history across the globe, with expeditions to Jordan, China, Peru and even the Antarctic to discover Shackleton's lost ship, Endurance. History Hit also works as a production company, in the last 3 years making 15 films presented by Dan Snow for Channel 5.
The Results
From long-form documentaries to viral YouTube videos, History Hit has become a full-spectrum digital content house with:
- Over 10 million listens and one million views a month combined across all podcasts
- 1.6 million YouTube subscribers,
- 1,250+ original documentaries
What’s Next?
Looking forward, History Hit is showing no signs of slowing down. Ubisoft have renewed its relationship to co-produce the Echoes of History podcast, which is now expanding to include a dedicated YouTube channel. For fans of Assassin’s Creed, the show offers even more historical content behind the game’s characters, events and landmarks.
Earlier in 2025, History Hit launched video podcasts for Dan Snow’s History Hit, The Ancients and After Dark on YouTube, with plans to grow their video podcast offering even further in the future. And more Ch5 commissions are in the pipeline…as well as a few other top secret projects.
Ten years after the creation of History Hit, it is clear that Dan is a pioneer creator driven by a vision to take history directly to audiences on their own terms. By understanding what audiences are looking for and listening to their behaviors, History Hit has evolved into a digital network that proves that nuance, depth, passion and creativity are still at the heart of successful storytelling.