The Data Journalism Podcast

Showing Your Work with Ben Welsh May 27, 2026 00:32:38 Ben Welsh is the news applications editor at Reuters. He joins the hosts to discuss his and Scott’s recent article, “Journalism lost its culture of sharing: Here’s how we rebuild it.” They share the ways they’ve seen open source culture change over time, and advice for increased collaboration across newsrooms.Special thanks to the NICAR team for all of their support! The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠music this episode

Documenting a Transit Nightmare with Greg Morton Apr 30, 2026 00:26:01 Greg Morton is the data editor for The Baltimore Banner. His story, “Transit nightmare: Thousands of Baltimore kids can’t get to school on time” won first place at the 2025 Philip Meyer Awards. We sat down with him at NICAR to go behind the scenes on the project.Special thanks to the NICAR team for all of their support! The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠music this episode⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, made with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠TwoTone⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠

What We Ask Google Apr 16, 2026 00:26:47 Our very own Simon Rogers is coming out with a book on May 5th! It’s called “What We Ask Google: A Surprisingly Hopeful History of Humankind.” Scott and Alberto got a chance to ask him all about the research and writing process, as well as what Simon hopes people take away from the book. You can preorder it now on the Penguin Random House website, or wherever you get your books.Work mentioned in t

DJP LIVE! with ProPublica’s data team Apr 1, 2026 00:49:45 The Data Journalism Podcast went live at the NICAR conference! On March 7, Simon, Scott and Alberto spoke with the team behind ProPublica’s Meyer Award-winning series, “Life of the Mother.” Reporter Andrea Suozzo and Deputy Data Editor Hannah Fresques go behind-the-scenes on their investigation into preventable deaths after the Supreme Court overturned Roe v. Wade. Plus, a montage of mini-intervie

Data for Everyone: The Open Visualization Academy Mar 17, 2026 00:41:00 The Open Visualization Academy is a new open-access education project, spearheaded by our very own Alberto Cairo! It launched last month, and two of the other instructors, Hannah Dormido and Frank Elavsky, join us to talk about their courses. Check out the project at openvisualizationacademy.org.The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠music this episode⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, made with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠TwoTone⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, represents Goo

Data journalism in the face of ICE and subzero temperatures in MN Jan 29, 2026 00:23:40 MaryJo Webster is data editor at the Minnesota Star Tribune. She joins Alberto, Scott and Simon to talk about her team’s ongoing coverage of federal immigration troops deployed in Minnesota. They discuss analyzing data in a breaking news environment, and what reporters in other places can learn from the Star Tribune’s approach.Subscribe to the Minnesota Star Tribune to read more of their coverage.

A Look Ahead to 2026 Jan 5, 2026 00:44:05 As a new year begins, Alberto, Scott and Simon reflect on the broader state of the industry. They discuss dataviz favorites from 2025, what they're working on in 2026, and thoughts on the upcoming year in data journalism.Work mentioned in the episode:Computation + Journalism conference"Organ Transplant System 'in Chaos' as Waiting Lists Are Ignored""The Legislative Netwo

Launching the Trans News Initiative Nov 25, 2025 00:41:00 The Trans News Initiative is a new project that tracks and analyzes news coverage of trans communities in the U.S. Our very own Alberto Cairo helped create it, and this week we're joined by three other guests who made it happen: Kae Petrin, Caitlyn Ralph, and Jan Diehm.Check it out at ⁠TransNewsInitiative.org⁠.Caitlyn Ralph is the studio director and partner at Polygraph, The Pudding's in-

Breaking New Ground with the Straits Times Nov 14, 2025 00:46:49 The Straits Times is Singapore’s most widely read print newspaper, and its online presence is full of innovative data visualization projects. Our guests this week — Charlene Chua, Hannah Ong, and Stephanie Adeline — are three of the young journalists making it happen. They join us to discuss their work and how the Straits Times became such a powerhouse of data journalism.Charlene Chua, Hannah Ong,

Charts as Political Theater Oct 14, 2025 00:38:38 Not since Ross Perot’s famous TV presentations using cardboard charts have we had a national figure who uses data visualization props quite like Donald Trump. This week, Philip Bump joins Scott and Simon to talk about Trump’s use of data, and how politicians more generally approach information visuals. Plus, they discuss Philip’s background, how he measures success as a solo blogger, and the futur

Roundtable: The shifting data landscape Sep 9, 2025 00:35:55 Data analysis is at an inflection point, with new technologies entering the field, and increasingly more practitioners working outside of journalism. This week, Alberto, Simon and Scott reflect on how they got into data journalism, and what’s changed over the years. They discuss how each of their career paths took them into newsrooms — and then out of them again — and identify key takeaways for th

Outlier 2025: Dispatch from the data visualization community Jul 8, 2025 00:25:55 Outlier is a one-of-a-kind conference, held annually by the Data Visualization Society. This year it was hosted at the University of Miami, where our very own Alberto gave the closing keynote. In this special episode, Scott and Simon chat with Alberto about the conference, his keynote, and the state of the data visualization industry today.Check out Alberto's presentation here to learn more ab

Finding Ourselves in Historic Data Jun 17, 2025 00:40:12 “40 Acres and a Lie” tells the true story behind the Civil War–era “40 acres and a mule” program. It was the result of over two years of painstaking research by Alexia Fernández Campbell, April Simpson and Pratheek Rebala. The project won a Sigma Award and a Philip Meyer Data Journalism Award, and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize in explanatory reporting.Alexia, April and Pratheek join Albert

Datapocalypse! Are we losing our public data? Apr 22, 2025 00:32:49 Cheryl Phillips is Hearst Professional in Residence at Stanford University’s journalism program, and founder of Big Local News, which empowers journalists with data – and has twice been on Pulitzer prize winning news teams. Now she has devoted herself to empowering journalists with access to the data they need to tell great stories.She joins Alberto, Scott and Simon to discuss the state of public

Chiqui Esteban: inside the Washington Post graphics team and how to visualize opinion Feb 6, 2025 00:46:00 Chiqui Esteban is Design & Art Director at the Washington Post Opinion section. In the first episode with new co-host Scott Klein, he talks to us about the lessons he's learned during his amazing career, from his early days as a student at a famous visual journalism program in Spain all the way to running the Washington Post’s graphics desk, one of the best in the world —and beyond. Chiqui

Scott Klein: tales of 2024 Dec 17, 2024 00:55:20 It was a year in which a Presidential candidate said a chart saved his life, generative AI changed journalism and we worried about whether the field is getting less innovative. Scott Klein is an entrepreneur in residence at Newspack, helping publishers on WordPress and other platforms do great election coverage by building and adopting innovative tools and by working together. He was previously a

David Spiegelhalter: The Art of Uncertainty Dec 4, 2024 00:35:44 David Spiegelhalter is Emeritus Professor of Statistics in the Statistical Laboratory, University of Cambridge and author of new book The Art of Uncertainty We live in chaotic times and David makes that world a little clearer with humour and clarity in this special interview with Alberto and Simon. The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠music this episode⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠ made with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠TwoTone⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠, comes from David, and r

Kae Petrin: data for change Oct 15, 2024 00:23:52 Kae Petrin is a data and graphics reporting at Chalkbeat, Votebeat, and Healthbeat, where they produce stories on education and voting rights. Kae is also a co-founder and part of the leadership of the Trans Journalists Association. In the episode we discuss Kae's work, their view of beat-centric news organizations, and the challenges of K-12 education data. The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠music this episode⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠,⁠

Garrett Archer: on the election data frontline in Arizona Sep 23, 2024 00:24:36 Garrett Archer is the data analyst at ABC15 in Phoenix, Arizona, where he is a data storyteller and one of the foremost experts on Arizona's election system. As America votes, Garrett will be responsible for reporting the facts in one of the most tightly-fought US elections for decades. Find out how he approaches election data, what makes it different to polling reporting and what will happe

Sisi Wei: data stories at The Markup and CalMatters Jul 15, 2024 00:29:10 Sisi Wei is the Chief Impact Officer at CalMatters & The Markup, based in New York. Sisi founded the DEI Coalition For Anti-Racist, Equitable, And Just Newsrooms and was the Assistant Managing Editor at ProPublica. She has also won the Gwen Ifill Award. Alberto chats with Sisi about her work and how she approaches telling stories with data. The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠music this episode⁠⁠⁠,⁠ made with⁠⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠T

AI and data journalism: the AP's Garance Burke Jun 26, 2024 00:33:13 Garance Burke is a global investigative reporter for the Associated Press, with a focus on reporting around Artificial Intelligence. She wrote the chapter of the AP style guide around reporting on AI and leads a team which works with data to tell stories every day. She joins Simon and Alberto to discuss the implications for data journalism. The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠⁠music this episode⁠⁠,⁠ made with⁠⁠⁠⁠ ⁠TwoTone⁠⁠

How the Pulitzer Center does data journalism May 31, 2024 00:27:23 How does the Pulitzer Center create such great data journalism? Alberto and Simon are joined by Doménica Montaño, the Center's program coordinator for environmental investigations. Working with terrific data journalists like director Gustavo Faleiros and Kuek Ser Kuang Keng, the team produces groundbreaking data work. Doménica explains what it takes to make that work come to life. The⁠ ⁠⁠⁠musi

The Cool Grey City of Data: inside the San Francisco Chronicle's data team Apr 29, 2024 00:49:17 Dan Kopf and Nami Sumida join Simon and Alberto to discuss how the SF Chronicle tells data stories, such as Sumida's recent exploration of the city's Japantown (sub required) and the WW2 internment that nearly destroyed it. The team discuss what makes the Bay Area such a rich source of data journalism and how the Chron approaches it each day. The⁠ ⁠⁠music this episode,⁠ made with⁠⁠ ⁠TwoTon

Anna Brand: data journalism for CNN Jan 10, 2024 00:26:57 Anna Brand is the Managing Editor for Data and Graphics at CNN Digital. She chats with Simon and Alberto about building a data journalism team at the news outlet, explains how it works and what inspires her. The⁠ ⁠music this week⁠⁠, made with⁠ ⁠TwoTone⁠⁠, is based on the data behind this CNN Digital story about Halloween candy.

Holiday special: why data storytelling matters Dec 18, 2023 00:44:11 It’s a different kind of podcast this week: Simon and Alberto talk about Alberto’s latest book, The Art of Insight, why data journalism is still a dream job and our approaches to working with numbers to tell stories. Find out what books got us here - and what we care about most, when it comes to data storytelling. The ⁠music this week⁠, made with ⁠TwoTone⁠, is based on snowfall in Central Park fr

"Hungary is a data journalism superpower" Dec 4, 2023 00:33:02 Attila Bátorfy is a data journalist operating in Viktor Orbán's Hungary, heading up ATLO and pioneering the field in the country as a teacher and practitioner. Find out why he believes Hungary is the country to watch for data storytelling. Music by ⁠TwoTone⁠, based on data about rising Hungary's falling population. You can hear the ⁠full (long) track here⁠.

Data journalism at The Guardian Oct 12, 2023 01:00:22 The Guardian's Pamela Duncan and Ashley Kirk join Simon to talk about how data journalism has changed since he was there, how the news organisation works today and what is coming next. Music by TwoTone, based on data from this story about rising surface temperatures. You can hear the full (long) track here.

Alan Smith: Inside the FT's data journalism operation Aug 9, 2023 00:34:31 Alan Smith is a rare breed: he leads the FT's team of data reporters and designers, but has a background in the stuffy world of official statistics as former head of digital content at the UK's Office for National Statistics. Alan is also author of How Charts Work, a handbook on designing with data using the FT's principles. He chats with Simon and Alberto about his approach to data jo

Data journalism in Kenya, with Eunice Magwambo Jun 14, 2023 00:37:10 This week we meet data journalist Eunice Magwambo, whose team has trained over 2,000 journalists in data journalism and visualisation and is part of a new movement of talented data reporters in the region. She talks about how data journalism in Africa is different, the appetite for data-led stories and the importance of sharing those visuals. You can find more of Eunice's work here.

Live from Perugia: Data Journalism in Small Newsrooms Apr 26, 2023 00:51:53 Recorded live at the International Journalism Fesitival in Perugia, Italy on April 21, 2023. This panel brought together some great practitioners producing award-winning data journalism in small newsrooms and sometimes on their own. Moderated by Simon, the panel includes: Yvette Cabrera, Center for Public Integrity Miguel Angel Dobrich, Dobcast, Uruguay Yao-Hua Law, Macaranga, Malaysia Sisi Wei, T

Live from Perugia: The State of Data Journalism Today at the International Journalism Festival Apr 21, 2023 00:53:40 It's a different kind of episode! Live from the 2023 International Journalism Festival in Perugia, this session features co-host Simon plus the following great speakers: Tara Kelly, data editor at the European Journalism Centre Sondre Solstad is The Economist’s Senior Data Journalist Moderated by Lars Boering, director of the EJC The session looks at how data journalists work, who they collabo

The Sigmas: inside the world's data journalism awards Mar 30, 2023 00:31:20 How do you judge data journalism in 2023? The Sigma Data Journalism Awards is the only global award for the field and this episode sees Simon and Alberto chatting with Gina Chua, Aron Pilhofer, Kuek Ser Kuang Keng and Marianne Bouchart to discuss the state of data journalism today, the point of the awards and what's happening next. The music is based on daily entries for the awards this season

Rani Molla: data for journalism Mar 20, 2023 00:26:25 Rani Molla is a senior correspondent at Vox Media, reporting for Recode on the intersection between work, technology and the future. She uses data to tell stories every day, whether it's about our return to the office (or lack of), the impacts of AI on our world or the rise of burnout. In the latest episode of the pod, we chat about how she uses data to tell stories, her favourite tools and wh

Florence Nightingale and the history of dataviz Mar 13, 2023 00:41:10 RJ Andrews is the founder of data design studio Info We Trust and author of a new series of books delving into the deep history of of data visualisation and storytelling. In this episode of the pod, he talks about three significant parts of the history of data visuals: Florence Nightingale, Emma Willard and Étienne-Jules Marey. While Nightingale created powerful visuals that changed how we underst

The science of dataviz, with Jen Christiansen Feb 27, 2023 00:35:04 Jen Christiansen is the author of Building Science Graphics (published by A K Peters/CRC Press) and a senior graphics editor at Scientific American. In this episode of the pod, she talks about her approach to visualising scientific stories and to graphics, based on her long career in the field. "For any scientist to  have their work in the lab or in the field and be worthwhile, you need to co

CNN's Harry Enten: Data for TV Jan 30, 2023 00:35:21 Harry Enten (@forecasterenten on Twitter) is one of the most-high-profile data journalists in the world. He explains the numbers every day on CNN - whether it's election polling, sports or even his original passion: meterology, specifically snowstorms. "I definitely see myself as a storyteller," says Enten and he chats with Alberto and Simon about his approach to making the numbers understandable

Nigel Holmes: the joy of data Dec 12, 2022 00:31:10 Nigel Holmes is a graphic designer, author, and theorist, who focuses on information graphics and information design. He's also the author of a new book, Joyful Infographics, a personal journey through visual design. Alberto and Simon chat with Nigel about why humanity and fun is so vital in graphics. The music this week, made with TwoTone, is is based on honey production in the US, from 1998 to 2

Nathan Yau: the flow of dataviz Nov 25, 2022 00:23:20 Nathan Yau is behind one of the world's most influential data journalism and visualisation websites: Flowing Data. A statistician, Nathan started the site as a resource for students but it has become a go-to destination to find out the latest in data journalism. We discuss why dataviz matters, how to learn R and the quiz of the week. The music this week, made with TwoTone, is the percentage of peo

Amanda Cox: bringing facts to the people Oct 31, 2022 00:31:56 Amanda Cox is Head of Special Data Projects at USAFacts, an unrivaled source of public data in the US. She's also an established data journalist and former editor of the NYT's Upshot data journalism section. As the winner of multiple awards, she's been referred to as the "Michael Phelps of infographics". She chats with Simon and Alberto about her career, how she feels about treemaps and how to put

How Axios brings smart brevity to data journalism Sep 15, 2022 00:37:41 The Axios team have spearheaded 'smart brevity', but how does that apply to data journalism and data visualisation? Alberto and Simon chat with the team that makes it happen: Danielle Alberti, Jacque Schrag and Will Chase about how they work and what makes a project 'Axios'.  You can check out the midterms project the team worked on with Google Trends data here.  Here are some more proje

Inside the New York Times Graphics Team Aug 25, 2022 00:36:12 Archie Tse is the Graphics Director at The New York Times. He has been at The Times since 1995, and he has pioneered graphics reporting, often in person - especially after 9/11, traveling to Iraq to cover the US invasion, and reporting on the capture of Saddam Hussein. He is even credited by some with being an early adopter of identifying Republicans with the colour red and Democrats with the colo

Information is Beautiful: an interview with David McCandless Jun 8, 2022 00:37:30 One of the most successful published data journalists in the world today, David McCandless has a new book out: Beautiful News. His work is innovative, newsy, current and incredibly popular with readers — but sometimes controversial with what he calls the "chart police".  Alberto and Simon chat with David about why he gets such Marmite-type reactions to his work, how Hans Rosling opened our ey

Jessica Huseman: data stories for the US Midterm elections May 9, 2022 00:34:03 Election reporting has become one of the most important journalism beats in America as we barrel towards the midterm elections. How can data journalism help? Jessica Huseman has become the face of election reporting in America. Editorial Director at Votebeat, she also owns the data journalism training organistion Friendly State News and previously worked at ProPublica on the Electionland project.

A Data Journalist in Ukraine Mar 10, 2022 00:23:27 Anatoliy Bondarenko is Data editor at Texty.org.ua, an award-winning news and data site in Ukraine, from where he joins Alberto and Simon to discuss his life in a war zone as a data journalist. His team's work to analyse misinformation has won a Sigma data journalism award for best News Application and they are still producing great data journalism today, even as the country is under attack. 

Data journalism for the people! Ben Welsh and MaryJo Webster on the state of local data journalism Feb 9, 2022 00:45:43 How do you make data journalism that matters to people about where they live? In the latest Data Journalism Podcast, Alberto and Simon explore local data journalism with two of the leading practitioners of the field. MaryJo Webster is the data editor for the Star Tribune in Minneapolis and has devoted herself to training data journalists. Ben Welsh is the editor of the Data and Graphics Department

2021 in data journalism: Scott Klein on how ProPublica does it, plus our favourite projects of the year Dec 17, 2021 00:37:37 Scott Klein leads the teams at ProPublica that work at the intersection of journalism and technology. His teams have been recognized with a Peabody Award, several Online Journalism Awards for General Excellence, Malofiej International Infographics Award medals, the Data Journalism Award Jurors Choice Award, as well as Society for News Design Awards of Excellence, including one special recognition

Inside The Pudding Nov 17, 2021 00:49:47 Matt Daniels and Caitlyn Ralph are just two of the team behind The Pudding, a visual collective of great visual data journalism - where you can find great longform data journalism such as this hunt for the internet’s oldest image, this guide to why women’s pockets are inferior and how many times a character says “cool” in Community. And The Pudding crew also have a commercial arm too: Polygraph, w

Eva Constanteras: doing data journalism in Afghanistan, Myanmar and across the Global South Sep 28, 2021 00:31:55 Eva Constantaras is a data journalist with Internews and Lighthouse Reports who works around the world to establish data journalism units to tell public interest stories. She has worked with data journalists in Afghanistan, Myanmar and many other places around the world where numbers can make a difference. Eva chats on the podcast about data journalism in failing states and her process to help rep

The Census data was published. What does it mean for data journalists? Aug 20, 2021 00:31:54 Angeliki Kastanis is a data journalist at The Associated Press and an expert on the US Census.  They talk with Alberto and Simon about what the 2020 Census data released so far told us, offers tips and tricks for getting the most out of it for reporters - and even working as a Census enumerator.  Key links: censusreporter, AP Census Hub The music this week is based on the US Census (data

US Census bonus episode Aug 11, 2021 00:19:05 Tomorrow (August 12) sees the release of crucial US Census redistricting data - which will shape US government and politics for the next crucial election cycles. It will also give us unique insights into the changing demographic makeup of regions across the US. Alberto and Simon chat with Joe Germuska (executive director at @KnightLab and Project lead @CensusReporter) and Cheryl Phillips (Data/inv

Stuart Thompson and Sergio Peçanha: how to use data for comment Jul 30, 2021 00:33:10 We all know that data visualization is a great tool to explore and make sense of numbers, and also to communicate those numbers to people. But there is also a long historical tradition in visualization that uses graphs, charts, and maps for persuasion. Think, for instance, of Florence Nightingale, who used data and charts to persuade the English authorities to improve the living conditions of sold

COVID data journalism special episode Jun 8, 2021 00:50:21 In the latest episode of the pod, Alberto and Simon get to grips with COVID19 data and the challenges of reporting on the numbers during a pandemic.  Financial Times senior visual journalist John Burn-Murdoch explains how he hunts for the key data and talks through what he thinks we will see happening next.  The Covid Tracking Project's co-founder Alexis Madrigal talks about how to gathe

How to make data journalism for humans May 14, 2021 01:13:00 In this episode Alberto and Simon talk to Lam Thuy Vo, a polymath data journalist who works for Buzzfeed and teaches at CUNY. We discussed her data-driven investigative stories, her quantified self projects, and her interest in providing learning resources for data journalists from underrepresented communities.  Next, we talked to visualization designers Shirley Wu and Nadieh Bremer about the

How do you judge data journalism? Apr 27, 2021 00:53:10 In this first episode, we go inside the Sigma Awards - the only global award for data journalism. Joining Alberto and Simon are journalists Gina Chua, Aron Pilhofer, Kuek Ser Kuang Keng and Marianne Bouchart to discuss the state of data journalism today, the point of awards and what's happening next. The music is based on historic data of the US economy, such as GDP and revenue. You can create you

TEASER: Introducing The Data Journalism Podcast Apr 22, 2021 00:01:17 New: welcome to The Data Journalism Podcast, the first podcast devoted to doing journalism with numbers. Hosts Alberto Cairo and Simon Rogers  will explore the latest in data journalism. You will meet the world’s top data journalists - and you will find out how they do what they do. Subscribe to see how data is changing the world of journalism forever.

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