January 21, 2008 – September 13, 2025
Life After People is a television series on which scientists, mechanical engineers, and other experts speculate about what might become of planet Earth if humanity suddenly disappeared. The featured experts also talk about the impact of human absence on the environment and the vestiges of civilization thus left behind. The series was preceded by a two-hour special that aired on January 21, 2008, on the History Channel which served as a de facto pilot for the series that premiered April 21, 2009. The documentary and subsequent series were both narrated by James Lurie.
After a 15-year hiatus, History premiered a new third season on July 14, 2025. This third season used AI to generate most of the show.
Format
The program does not speculate on how humanity may disappear, stipulating only that it has, and that it has done so suddenly, leaving everything behind including household pets and livestock that have to fend for themselves. The thought experiment is based on documented results of the sudden removal of humans from a geographical area and thus, the discontinuation of the maintenance of buildings and urban infrastructure. Lurie's narration begins:
What would happen if every human on Earth disappeared? This isn't the story of how we might vanish...it is the story of what will happen to the world we leave behind.
The series' episodes thematically offer examples of urban and biological decay. The focus is on specific locations such as skyscrapers, religious icons, bridges and dams, and government buildings, and the fate of certain related objects, such as artifacts, documents and human bodies. The fate of some kinds of flora and fauna are covered as well. Each episode also contains a segment in which experts examine real locations that have been abandoned by people, including ghost towns and other sites of deterioration, where the deterioration has been caused by events similar to those outlined in the episode. Although the series speculates on the fates of landmarks around the world, the main focus is on situations that may occur at locations in the United States.
The various events that may occur after people disappear suddenly are depicted using CGI dramatizations. The timeline of predicted events begins approximately one day after the disappearance of humankind and extends at various intervals up to one hundred million years into the future.
Beginning with the third season, there is use of AI generated video. The new season's executive producer, Yoshi Stone, claimed that using AI technology helped them to "react much more quickly and really expand our visual horizons" at a lower cost. He cited Las Vegas as an example, in which he claimed that using AI helped them to visualize the entire city as a whole and not just limited to a single block or casino.
Sound Effects Used
- Alphabetically
- By Episode
- By Library