The Beatles Anthology is a multimedia retrospective project consisting of a television documentary, a four-volume set of double albums, and a book describing the history of the Beatles. Beatles members Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr participated in the making of the works, which are sometimes referred to collectively as the Anthology project, while John Lennon appears in archival interviews.

The documentary series was first broadcast in November 1995, with expanded versions released on VHS and LaserDisc in 1996 and on DVD in 2003. The documentary used interviews with the Beatles and their associates to narrate the history of the band as seen through archival footage and performances. The Anthology book, released in 2000, paralleled the documentary in presenting the group's history through quotes from interviews.

The initial volume of the album set (Anthology 1) was released the same week of the documentary's airdate, with the subsequent two volumes (Anthology 2 and Anthology 3) released in 1996. They included unreleased performances and outtakes presented in roughly chronological order, along with two new songs based on demo tapes recorded by Lennon after the group broke up: "Free as a Bird" and "Real Love", both produced by Jeff Lynne.

The Beatles Anthology 2025 was officially announced on August 21, 2025, featuring a remastered documentary series expanded with an additional ninth episode and a new box set containing a new compilation album, Anthology 4, alongside remastered editions of Anthology 1, 2, and 3. The box set was released on November 21, 2025, and the new series premiered five days later on Disney+.

Documentary series

Approximately coinciding with the release of the "Free as a Bird" single and Anthology 1 album (the first of three double-CD albums), The Beatles Anthology series of documentaries was broadcast on ITV in the United Kingdom and ABC television in the United States in 1995. The Anthology series takes a form similar to that of the Anthology book, by being a series of first-person accounts by the Beatles themselves, with no external "objective" narration. Footage in the Anthology series features voice-over recordings of all four Beatles to push the narrative of the story, with contributions from their producer, road manager and others. As well as telling their story through archival footage, Paul McCartney, George Harrison and Ringo Starr appear in interview segments recorded exclusively for the series; John Lennon appears only in historic archival footage. Other key people in the Beatles story such as producer George Martin, road manager Neil Aspinall, and publicist Derek Taylor also gave extensive interview segments, with manager Brian Epstein appearing in archival footage.

The series, which included over 5000 hours of planning and production, is composed of numerous film clips and interviews that present a complete history of the band from the Beatles' own personal perspectives. When it aired on ABC, the series comprised six hour-long programs, aired on three nights in November 1995. The series was later released as eight expanded episodes on VHS, laserdisc and as a boxed set of five DVDs (four discs with two episodes apiece and a disc of extras).

Air dates on ABC:

  • Sunday, 19 November 1995: 9–11 p.m.
  • Wednesday, 22 November 1995: 9–11 p.m.
  • Thursday, 23 November 1995: 9–11 p.m.

Part 1 of the series drew 17 million households, meaning an average of 27.3 million viewers, which was much better than usual for ABC at the time, but behind most broadcasts of Friends on NBC,

Anthology Highlights track listing

  1. "Free as a Bird" – 4:25
  2. "One After 909" (Complete) – 2:55
  3. "That Means a Lot" – 2:26
  4. "Leave My Kitten Alone" – 2:56
  5. "If You've Got Trouble" – 2:48
  6. "Can't Buy Me Love" – 2:10
  7. "Mr. Moonlight" – 2:47
  8. "Kansas City / Hey-Hey-Hey-Hey!" – 2:46
  9. "Eight Days a Week" (Complete) – 2:47
  10. "I'm Looking Through You" – 2:53
  11. "Yesterday" – 2:34
  12. "Tomorrow Never Knows" (Take 1) – 3:14
  13. "Strawberry Fields Forever" (Take 1) – 2:34
  14. "Across the Universe" (Take 2) – 3:30
  15. "Something" – 3:18
  16. "Not Guilty" – 3:22
  17. "Octopus's Garden" – 2:49
  18. "All Things Must Pass" – 3:04
  19. "Come and Get It" – 2:30
  20. "Good Night" – 2:38
  21. "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" – 3:27
  22. "The Long and Winding Road" – 3:41
  23. "Real Love" – 3:54

Book

In October 2000, The Beatles Anthology book was released, which included interviews with all four band members and others involved, plus rare photos. Many of the interviews quoted are from those featured in the documentary films. The book is designed as a large-format hardback, with imaginative artwork throughout, and several visually vibrant and colourful spreads featuring graphics relevant to the proceeding chronology, photographic arrays and a variety of text styles and layouts. The book went straight to the top of The New York Times bestsellers list. In 2002, the book was released as a large-format paperback. In October 2025, the book was reissued for its 25th anniversary.

Anthology Collection box set and Anthology 4

During 2025, fans speculated that a restored and remastered version of the Anthology series would be released to commemorate the 30th anniversary. Following several teasers, it was officially announced on August 21, 2025. The series, premiering on Disney+ on November 26, 2025, has been expanded from eight to nine episodes, with the ninth episode featuring unreleased footage alongside new interviews.

The 2025 remaster project also includes the Anthology Collection, an expanded box set featuring Anthology 4, a new album consisting of additional studio outtakes compiled by Giles Martin, alongside remastered editions of the previous three volumes. The new compilation also features new mixes of "Free as a Bird" and "Real Love", using the demixing technology used in the making of "Now and Then" to isolate and clean up Lennon's vocal track, as well as "Now and Then" itself.

The remasters of the first three Anthology albums were released to streaming services on August 21, 2025 (though they would be removed a day later), along with the 2025 remix of "Free as a Bird" as a digital single. The physical box set of the Anthology Collection was released on November 21, 2025, on both vinyl and CD, with the digital version of the Anthology 4 album also being released to streaming services and digital retailers the same day. The restored documentary series premiered five days later on Disney+.

The track "Carnival of Light", recorded during the Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band sessions, was intended to be released on the Anthology 2 album, but was vetoed by George Harrison.

It was reported that McCartney, Harrison and Starr worked on a new composition called "All for Love" in March 1995, intended as a track on Anthology 3, but the effort was abandoned. No version of the song has reached the public.

McCartney, Harrison, Starr, and Jeff Lynne attempted a full band recording of Lennon's song "Now and Then" using his demo vocals, intending it to anchor Anthology 3. The poor fidelity and excessive ambient noise of the original tape proved too difficult to alleviate with contemporary digital equipment, and the song was abandoned. George Harrison was dismissive of the quality of the song, calling it "fucking rubbish". The song was replaced as the opening track on Anthology 3 with "A Beginning", an outtake from the recording sessions for The Beatles (1968). In 2023, McCartney, Starr and Giles Martin refurbished and completed the track, using artificial intelligence to extricate Lennon's vocal from the demo tape, and released it as a "final Beatles song", both as a single and as a bonus track on the expanded edition of the 1967-1970 compilation album.

Promotional items

Each of the three Anthology albums was accompanied by a promotional CD sampler sent to radio stations shortly before the official release dates. These CDs have since become highly sought collector's items. Even rarer is a vinyl version of the sampler for Anthology 2, which was only sent to college radio stations and featured a different cover (though the contents were the same).

In October 1996 there was a strictly limited release from EMI, a slip case cover to house all three CD volumes, which have since become extremely rare, fetching high prices among collectors.

Parodies

The success of the Anthology albums was parodied by the release of the Rutles' Archaeology some months later. Delays in the release of the third volume of the Beatles' series ultimately meant that the Rutles' parody arrived in shops on the same day as its inspiration.

"Weird Al" Yankovic parodied The Beatles Anthology in an Al TV special. He said he had a copy of a fictional Anthology 17, which he claimed would not be available to the public for a while. He played for the audience a track of Paul McCartney brushing his teeth and Ringo Starr shaving before The Ed Sullivan Show. Yankovic also considered parodying the album's single "Free as a Bird" as "Gee, I'm a Nerd", and requested McCartney's permission for the parody. McCartney had no problem with the parody; however, since "Free as a Bird" was written by John Lennon, he deferred the decision to Yoko Ono, who was not comfortable with the idea.

The Beatles Anthology was also parodied on the short-lived Dana Carvey Show, which was being aired on ABC around the same time that Anthology was being televised on the network.

On Late Night with Conan O'Brien, the host had parodies of the remaining Beatles adding music and doing backup singing to a fictitious vocal track from John Lennon's answering machine.

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