documentary

American  

[dok-yuh-men-tuh-ree, -tree] / ˌdɒk jəˈmɛn tə ri, -tri /

adjective

1. Also documental pertaining to, consisting of, or derived from documents.

   a documentary history of France.

2. Movies, Television. based on or re-creating an actual event, era, life story, etc., that purports to be factually accurate and contains no fictional elements.

   a documentary life of Gandhi.

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noun

• documentaries
  plural

1. Movies, Television. a documentary film, radio or television program, etc.

documentary British  

/ ˌdɒkjʊˈmɛntərɪ, -trɪ /

adjective

1. Also: documental.  consisting of, derived from, or relating to documents

2. presenting factual material with little or no fictional additions

   the book gives a documentary account of the war

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noun

1. a factual film or television programme about an event, person, etc, presenting the facts with little or no fiction

Other Word Forms

Derived Forms

• nondocumental
  adjective
• nondocumentary
  adjective
• predocumentary
  adjective
• semidocumentary
  adjective
• undocumentary
  adjective
• documentarily
  adverb

Inflected Forms

Nouns

• documentaries
  plural

Etymology

Origin of documentary

First recorded in 1795–1805; document + -ary

Explanation

A documentary is a film or video examining an event or person based on facts. The word can also refer to anything involving documents. The idea of documentary as meaning "pertaining to documents" came about at the beginning of the 19th century. Later, it came to mean a factual record of something. On PBS, you'll see lots of documentaries, about everything from baseball to war. Those documentaries are nonfiction films — they're showing true life. However, lots of fictional shows are filmed in a realistic documentary style. If you make a documentary about the U.S. Library of Congress, you'll be documenting lots of historical documents.

Example Sentences

See Examples For:

documentary documentaries

It won the 2025 documentary feature film Oscar.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 19, 2026

There’s a clip in the documentary of this interview that’s become very famous, of Woody Allen interviewing you when you were also 17.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 19, 2026

Hollywood actor Michael Sheen said he had a "constructive" meeting with First Minister Rhun ap Iorwerth over toxic dumping claims raised in his BBC documentary.

From BBC ● Sep. 18, 2026

It’s heartening to see that documentary filmmaking can still change lives.

From Salon ● Sep. 18, 2026

Palsson and Bobby might see some money, it was suggested, if the film made a profit, although it was highly unlikely for a documentary to realize even a slight windfall.

From "Endgame" by Frank Brady

Michele was a well-regarded photographer who also produced documentaries and podcasts.

From Los Angeles Times ● Sep. 15, 2026

“That was nerve-racking for us watching from a distance,” said Lovelace, who has also worked with Southern on documentaries about Blur and LCD Soundsystem.

From The Wall Street Journal ● Sep. 14, 2026

Selected by a special panel of filmmakers and critics, the films on this list span over 100 years of cinema and include comedies, horror flicks, dramas, documentaries, and beyond.

From Slate ● Sep. 11, 2026

Celebrity-led programmes still featured in the Authored Documentary category, with documentaries from Olympian Sir Chris Hoy, former Little Mix singer Jesy Nelson, and Sharon Osbourne's film about her late husband Ozzy among the nominees.

From BBC ● Sep. 9, 2026

So when I started explaining McCoy and Celia and everything that had happened this year, she absorbed it the way my parents absorbed war documentaries: with complete seriousness.

From "Made You Up" by Francesca Zappia

Related Words

• broadcast
• feature
• film
• narrative