INTERNATIONALDOCUMENTARY DAYAPRIL 16
INTERNATIONALApril 16 — Annually, Worldwide
A global day celebrating documentary storytelling and the people who make it.
April 16
2026
#InternationalDocumentaryDay
Support for the films that share what’s real — and the people who make them possible.
Get involvedInternational Documentary Day exists to support the documentary community by celebrating, elevating, and promoting documentary storytelling around the world. The day recognizes the power of documentaries to reveal truth, preserve history, amplify unheard voices, and inspire meaningful change.
They deserve our attention, celebration and support, on this day and all year long.
Documentaries help societies remember, reflect, and understand. This global day encourages audiences everywhere to watch, discuss, and support documentary films and the creators behind them.
International Documentary Day
They reveal what power sometimes hides.
They give a voice to people too often unheard.
They preserve memories.
They challenge comfort.
They can turn headlines into action.
They inspire us — and stay with us.
Stream a documentary, head to your local theater, or buy tickets to an upcoming film festival.
Explore documentary festivalsThe films that change people travel by word of mouth far more than by advertising. Post on social. Tag us on IG or FB and we’ll help amplify.
#InternationalDocumentaryDay
Follow the filmmakers, help fund their work when you can, and support the organizations that finance and defend documentary storytelling.
See organizationsA living room, a classroom, a community hall. One film and a conversation afterwards is what the IRL experience is all about.
See the world.
Then see what you can do.
Look again and you will notice the same thing in nearly every frame: the subject appears twice — once in the room, and once on the monitor. That second image is the film. Documentary is not found, it is made, by people who chose where to stand (or sit).
The Lumière brothers screen Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory in Lyon. The camera is pointed at ordinary life.
Robert J. Flaherty releases Nanook of the North, widely regarded as the first feature-length documentary.
The British filmmaker John Grierson first uses the word “documentary.”
The Academy Awards recognize documentary films for the first time.
Film is entered as historical evidence at the Nuremberg trials.
Observational documentary and cinéma vérité bring filmmakers closer to unfolding reality.
Super 8 puts a motion picture camera in ordinary hands.
Digital tools collapse the cost of shooting and cutting.
Streaming carries documentaries to a global audience, and citizen documentation becomes ubiquitous.
Virtual screenings expand access when theaters close.
The first International Documentary Day is observed on April 16.
Want your festival listed? Reach out. We’d love to hear from you.
Want your association listed? Reach out. We’d love to hear from you.
International Documentary Day was founded by documentary filmmakers and storytellers who understand both the power of the form and the passion, persistence, and collaboration it takes to bring real stories to audiences.
Behind the initiative is an advisory board of documentary filmmakers, festival insiders, journalists, and doc fans — each bringing a different perspective and a shared belief in the importance of nonfiction storytelling.
Together, they’re helping build a global celebration that belongs to the documentary community — and everyone who believes real stories matter.
Founder / President
Carrie Carroll is a filmmaker, producer and storyteller who believes documentary has a unique power to help us see the world — and one another — more clearly. Through her work with Embers & Oak Storyworks, she has seen firsthand how documentary storytelling can connect people across communities and cultures. She founded International Documentary Day to celebrate that power and the people who bring real stories to life.
Founding Member / Vice President, Communications & Industry Relations
Phillip Nakov is a public relations and marketing strategist with more than two decades of experience connecting films, filmmakers and cultural organizations with audiences. As founder of CountingDown.com, a fan-led movie website, and City PR+Marketing, he brings together storytelling, media relations and industry partnerships. His background includes Allied Global Marketing and the Film Independent Spirit Awards. He joins International Documentary Day to help champion documentary storytelling, build connections across the industry and celebrate the filmmakers who bring real stories to the screen.
Founding Member / Vice President, Social Media & Community
An unabashed cinema geek, Larry Carroll has been orbiting around Hollywood for the past quarter century. With stints at movie studios (Artisan Entertainment, Paramount Pictures) and traditional media (MTV News, NBC), big tech (Microsoft, ZergNet) and smaller startups (CountingDown.com, IGN), his adventures in content have been translated into different languages all over the world, profiled by the LA Times, and appeared everywhere from Roger Ebert film books to the Times Square ticker. A writer, producer, tastemaker and occasional voiceover guy, Larry prides himself on being a nondiscriminatory fanboy of huge Hollywood blockbusters, forgotten ’40s film noirs, ’70s surrealism, microbudget documentaries, and everything in-between.
Coming soon.
If you’re interested in getting involved, reach out.