The Internet provides an endless stream of mindless entertainment. Every day you have the choice between YouTube clips, video chat pages, interactive games, and a lot more. If you are tired of yet another angry bird and seek some more stimulating ways to spend your time, may I suggest a few free online documentaries to watch?

Documentaries are a great way to gain insight into a world outside your own or to see things from a different perspective. They challenge your view of the world and stimulate new ideas. Documentaries can also be shocking and thought provoking. In any case, they keep those grey cells active and engaged.

Culture Unplugged

To understand Culture Unplugged, you have to understand its philosophy:

What we do matters, but why we do matters more. Individuality matters, but universality matters more. Idealism matters, but humanity matters more. Past & post matters, but present matters more. Product matters, but vision matters more. Process matters, but creativity matters more. Words & images matters, but the whole experience must matter most.

Culture Unplugged is concerned with the development of our society. They are presently running a Green Unplugged Film Festival, which highlights environmental documentaries. The festival is ad-free and non-commercial and survives on direct donations only.

To become involved, you can sign in with Facebook or sign up.

free online documentaries to watch

Culture Unplugged also received an entry in the MakeUseOf Directory.

SnagFilms

If you have a lot of time to kill and love documentaries, SnagFilms is the place to be. This social network-powered page provides a huge library of free online documentaries and a solid base of users that rate and discuss the films. Subsequently, you can browse videos by most popular, best rated, topics, channels, or simply from A to Z. If you feel like contributing yourself, you can log in using Google, Facebook, Twitter, and many more social network accounts.

watch documentaries online

SnagFilms was also introduced in the MakeUseOf Direcotry.

DocumentaryHeaven

DocumentaryHeaven strives to be the largest high quality directory of documentaries online. Launched in 2009, they have accumulated hundreds of handpicked videos in dozens of categories. Like SnagFilms, the site integrates social network logins and is supported by an active community of users, who submit, rate, and comment on films.

watch documentaries online

We have previously introduced you to DocumentaryHeaven in the MakeUseOf Directory.

Sprword

Sprword's mission is to spread the truth. It acts as a counter balance to mainstream media, which is driven by agendas and the mediocre public taste. The site provides links to controversial material, perspectives and worldviews that you will never see on TV. The Must Watch page is a good place to start.

watch documentaries online

Despite documentaries, you will also find articles, news, reflections, and a forum on Sprword.

Sprword has been profiled in the MakeUseOf Directory.

9/11 Documentaries

The event that changed the free world forever will shortly see its 10th anniversary and you can expect to see documentaries, comments, and replays all over the place.

911docs.net was created in an effort to aggregate all the documentaries and videos that document this tragic day in history. The material can be browsed via various categories and streamed straight from the website. Note that none of the streaming media is hosted on the site itself - it merely serves as a directory.

free online documentaries to watch

We have also profiled this page in the MakeUseOf Directory.

Don't know where to start? Try one of these 10 Awesome Free Documentaries That You Can Watch Online. Can't get enough? You should also check out The Best Places to Watch Documentary Movies Online. Feel like creating your own documentary? Learn How To Make A Documentary Online That Will Spread Like Wildfire.

What is your favorite place to watch documentaries and can you recommend any ones in particular?

Image credits: pani