Stories with LGBTQ characters and elements are identified when possible. Podcasts with frequent or severe content warnings are noted as are those which provide transcripts. Lately, audio dramas seem to be experimenting more with “chaotic action” – fights, headlong flight, etc. This often doesn’t work all that well; it is noted when significant. All the podcasts are accessible via most podcast apps and aggregators (although, weirdly, some apps seem to not catch entire seasons of some of the shows). Most of the series have episodes that run ~25-35 minutes; Exceptions will be noted. Frequency of posting will be identified when possible.

As there has been demand in previous posts, anthologies are now included. Shows are identified as:
• audio drama – stories with continuing plots and casts, either open- or closed-ended
• anthology – stand-alone stories with no continuity
• anthology with frame – stand-alone stories with some kind of continuity that ties the series together but (usually) does not affect the stories

Lastly, a fair number of these shows deal with mental illness, either upfront or as background themes. The sensitivity varies greatly, so, if this is an issue for you, tread cautiously. The most notable examples are identified in the descriptions.



Bridgewater (audio drama)
Folklore professor Jeremy Bradshaw is pulled into the mysterious 1980 disappearance of his father by new evidence that threatens to upend decades of certainty. Together with his father’s former partner, retired Detective Anne Becker, Jeremy must chase the clues that will tell him whether his father really did fall victim to a Satanic cult in the Bridgewater Triangle—or something much less explainable. Starring Misha Collins and other television actors. CW: Indigenous American elements that are… kind of TV-ish?
Frequency: weekly during the season
Tone: cults, local folklore, cryptids
LGBTQ: none
One season (10 episodes; ongoing)
Website


The Cipher (audio drama)
When 16-year-old Sabrina cracks the cryptic Parallax, she’s excited that she solved an online puzzle that baffled the world. But then she is kidnapped by a secret agency who believe she is the key to solving a series of murders. She escapes from them to find herself in the clutches of another secret agency who believes they have grown children with alien DNA. She escapes from them to another secret agency who believe that AI is the future. What is she supposed to believe? BBC production.
Tone: conspiracy, action, and aliens
LGBTQ: none
Complete story (10 episodes)
Website


City of Ghosts (audio drama)
El Rivkin, an acerbic information broker dealing in the dirty secrets of New York’s social, political, and financial elites, is hired to investigate a journalist’s murder. Aided by Prizrak, an agoraphobic researcher, and the voices of the dead, El begins to untangle a web of crimes that may involve the family her sister is marrying into. In noir fashion, the elites do not like their webs being untangled. Hovering over the investigation and El’s new ability to speak to ghosts is her history of mental illness. CW: treatment of metal illness; suicide references. Transcripts available.
Frequency: weekly
Tone: noir and ghosts
LGBTQ: bisexual protagonist
One season (6 episodes; ongoing)
Website


Fear Frequency (anthology with frame)
Dr. X.H. Balthazar talks about his researches into urban legends and cryptids, the later more original. There is some continuity from episode to episode, but they mostly stand on their own. It feels a bit like the writers heard A Voice from Darkness and decided to try and copy it, although with a narrator voice that somehow combines a bad Eastern European accent with an attempt at an extremely fruity RP. Not to be confused with a horror film podcast with the same name.
Length: 10-15 minutes
Frequency: irregular; several uploaded at a time
Tone: cryptids, creepypasta, and urban legends
LGBTQ: none important
One season (10 episodes; ongoing)
Website


Gods and Lies (audio drama)
In a world like today but where gods are real and walk among their worshipers, prayers are efficacious, and a variety of magical beings and artifacts exist in a semi-criminal demimonde, an investigator with a troubled past is called to a temple to investigate a murder. She quickly realizes that she needs help, and turns to a disgraced demigod for assistance for the less-legal aspects of the case. The first season can be treated as a stand-alone story, which is good because the second season is behind a paywall. Realm has pulled podcasts behind paywalls in the past, so, if this seems attractive, you may want to download it all. Transcripts available for subscribers.
Length: 40-50 minutes
Tone: noir and gods
LGBTQ: none important
One season (7 episodes; ongoing)
Website


Halfmoon Chronicles (audio drama)
In 1999, four friends set out to research the small town of Halfmoon, MA and record their findings. The town has a somewhat murky reputation for ghosts, but what the team finds is far stranger and soon brings up their own unresolved issues and half-buried griefs. The show’s grasp of the late 90s is sometimes a little shaky, but it is an atmospheric and engaging listen regardless. Transcripts available. Note that the official website is very behind in updating, and the descriptions in your podcast app will generally be more useful.
Length: 20-30 minutes
Frequency: weekly
Tone: small town horror, ghosts
LGBTQ: bisexual and nonbinary characters
One season (13 episodes + supplements; ongoing)
Website


Happy & We Know It (audio drama)
You remember If You’re Happy & You Know It, right? The sitcom that changed everything? The sitcom with more conspiracies surrounding it than two presidential assassinations combined? The sitcom that brought a nation together, and then tore it apart again? Well, Rory, Max, and guest host Martin sure do, and they will lead you through the show episode by episode, with behind-the-scenes insights, trivia, interviews with cast and crew - and more... A mocumentary podcast with a streak of cruel surreality.
Length: 40-60 minutes
Frequency: monthly
Tone: absurd comedy and horror, TV show nostalgia
LGBTQ: none
One season (6 episodes; ongoing)
Website


Horror Tree Stories (anthology with frame)
Two friends explore an abandoned asylum where they find cassette tapes with short poetic statements by the violent and menacing inmates. Who is leaving these tapes of rthem to find?
Length: 5-10 minutes
Frequency: biweekly
Tone: serial killers and asylum horror
LGBTQ: none
One season (3 episodes; ongoing)
Website


Howl
What would you do if your girlfriend was a werewolf? Kenni Monroe is a student at Talbot University and finds she has a lot to learn when her roommate goes missing and Kenni is dragged down a lesbian werewolf rabbit hole of myth, legend, and prophecy. This show is pretty rough as far as sound quality and reliance on chaotic action, but the creators are very enthusiastic about the project.
Length: 15-20 minutes
Frequency: biweekly?
Tone: college life and werewolves
LGBTQ: lesbian characters
One season (2 episodes + supplements; ongoing)
Website


Khôra (audio drama)
In this retelling of Greek myth in a science fiction setting, Atalanta and Medea use a stolen spaceship to try and return the FLCC to the planet Colchis, as the sometimes benevolent, mostly dangerous, Olympus Corp looms in the background. It’s got pirates, it’s got sentient spaceships, and it’s All About The Ladies! It’s also very queer. Transcripts available
Length: 35-45 minutes
Frequency: biweekly
Tone: Greek myth in space
LGBTQ: queer characters generally
One season (15 episodes + supplements; ongoing)
Website


Limelight: Harland (audio drama)
In the near future, the planned town of Harland, built on the site of a village abandoned 900 years earlier, is struggling with climate change and economic difficulties DI Ward finds herself baffled when a teen disappears, her twin begins acting strangely, and their house collapses into a sinkhole. Are the answers in the past or the future? In dreams or technology?
BBC production. The previous two Limelight series look interesting but not at all weird or supernatural.
Tone: near future, climate disaster, and folk horror
LGBTQ: none significant
Complete story (5 episodes)
Website


Liver Mortis (anthology)
Short stories, mostly gruesome but in different styles and tones, each one followed by a song, again in different styles and tones. Slightly hampered by having only two voice actors, but one can’t fault their ambition.
Frequency: they dropped 4 episodes one week, 4 more the next, next season is 2022
Tone: some Tales from the Crypt, some Twilight Zone, with music
LGBTQ: none important
One season (8 episodes; ongoing)
Website


Nyctophobia (audio drama/anthology)
This show takes a blended approach, telling stories in four episodes, so a little longer than most anthologies, but not a lengthy audio drama. While the series blends Eastern and Western folk horror, it uses the East and Southeast Asian symbolism of the number 4 to tie stories together. The first story is about two women who inherit a house and everything that comes with it, and the second story is about a family staying at an inn during a flower-viewing festival.
Length: ~20 minutes
Frequency: biweekly
Tone: folk horror and haunted houses
LGBTQ: lesbian characters
Two stories (6 episodes; ongoing)
Website


The Pale (anthology with frame)
Journalist Art Rosenblatt goes on an Antarctic cruise with his family. When one of his children briefly goes missing in a mysterious way, he begins to interview other passengers with their own odd experiences, some terrifying and some wonderful. Each story, however, brings more questions than answers.
Frequency: weekly
Tone: horror and wonder
LGBTQ: occasional gay and lesbian characters
One season (8 episodes + supplement; ongoing)
Website


See You in Your Nightmares
Harper Hart has been plagued by unrelenting insomnia ever since her twin sister, Callie, died. Her family sends her to the Lutwidge Wellness Center for Sleep Disorders where Dr. Faith Carter and her team use Blossom, a cutting-edge AI, in an experimental treatment to help patients face their dreams. Unfortunately, it seems there’s something evil stalking the Lutwidge’s residents in their dreams, and Harper will have to overcome her deepest fears to make it out alive. CW: the series skirts the edge of using mental illness as set dressing.
Frequency: weekly
Tone: psychiatric facility horror, YA
LGBTQ: minor characters
One season (9 episodes; ongoing)
Website


The Seventh Daughter (audio drama)
In the early 20th century, a mysterious woman tutors a young girl in the arts of mind reading and clairvoyance. From street-corner medicine shows to vaudeville amusement halls to the mansions of the wealthy and depraved, our heroine struggles to first survive, then to seek revenge for an old injustice. True to its carney roots, the story plays coy with whether any of the events are magical or spiritual or whether its all deception and delusion. Some depiction of anti-blackness and racism. It has the usual iHeart Radio intrusive ads.
Length: 30-45 minutes
Tone: Revenge, carnival psychics, and maybe magic
LGBTQ: none important
Complete story (10 episodes)
Website


Tower 4 (audio drama)
In the wake of an imploded life, Mike Archer has taken a job as a fire watcher in the Wyoming woods. He hopes to spend his days in a tower above the trees looking for fires and working on a book. He settles in and even makes friends with the often-heard but never seen watcher in Tower 3, but things aren't as quiet and peaceful as he hoped. Strange interference blasts over his radio at night and he starts seeing and hearing creepy noises in the woods. CW: a little heavy on “is Mike delusional.”
Length: mostly ~20 minutes, occasionally ~40
Frequency: monthly
Tone: conspiracy, cryptids, and isolation
LGBTQ: none
One season (9 episodes; second season just starting)
Website


The Unnatural (audio drama)
Set in the small town of Las Vegas, NM, a struggling state police detective, his new partner, and a begrudging spiritual healer reopen a hate crime investigation after a series of desecrated corpses appear. Along the way they will uncover truths about the town and its people that have been buried for decades. This is a terrifying story about truth, love, and the choices we make every day. Many Latinx characters. Transcripts available.
Length: 15-20 minutes
Frequency: biweekly
Tone: small town horror, body horror, gore
LGBTQ: none
One season (3 episodes; ongoing)
Website


We Are Not Safe Here (audio drama)
More like a serial audiobook, the intent seems to be to tell a different story each season. This season is about Betty, a “troubled teen” sent to a remote boarding school. The school is isolated and unwelcoming, and Betty is soon plagued by disturbing dreams which she realizes are shared by her classmates. A single narrator tells the story with slightly flat affect and rather jarring transitional music.
Frequency: weekly
Tone: boarding school horror and dreams
LGBTQ: none
One season (4 episodes; ongoing)
They do not appear to have a website


We Know None (audio drama)
Gwen is an acerbic college student with a knack for irritating her girlfriend’s mother and the police. Said girlfriend went away to college, dropped out and got an apprenticeship as a journalist. The two are aficionados of the paranormal, but Frankie has been going further and further afield, looking for an authentic story. Then she disappears, leaving behind a box of audiotapes of her investigations, and Gwen begins to doggedly follow their leads, hoping to find Frankie. Detailed CWs for each episode, especially issues of depression, anxiety, and suicidal thoughts. Transcripts available.
Length: 10-20 minutes
Frequency: weekly up until the end of season 1, then an 11 month wait for a Halloween prequel
Tone: folk horror and earie landscapes
LGBTQ: bisexual and lesbian protagonists
One season (11 episodes; ongoing)
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