Internet Rabbit Holes Worth Falling Down
The best rabbit holes don't end where you expect them to. We've picked twelve that consistently swallow our staff. Each entry has a starter link and the second link you'll need ten minutes later.
5 hand-picked links · independently reviewed · no sponsored placements · last reviewed by the editorial team July 2026
Historical Mysteries
The Dyatlov Pass Incident
Nine Soviet hikers, found dead in the Urals in 1959, in conditions that still aren't fully explained.
Russian government released new findings in 2020. The thread isn't closed.
The Bone Wars
Two 19th-century palaeontologists destroyed dinosaur skeletons to stop each other from finding them.
The reason there's no dinosaur exhibit at the Smithsonian that's actually right.
Obsessive Databases
Cetus Plays Pokémon archive
The full 16-day social experiment where 1.16 million people collectively played Pokémon Red.
A new religion was founded inside it. Look up Lord Helix.
Atlas Obscura
A user-curated atlas of 20,000+ weird and overlooked places.
Filter by your city. There's at least one.
Long Reads That Spiral
The Toast — 'I Have Some Notes on This Painting'
Mallory Ortberg's entire art-history archive.
Two monks inventing things. That is all you need to know.
Frequently asked
- What's an internet rabbit hole?
- A topic where one Wikipedia article links to the next, and the next, and three hours later you know the entire history of 1970s Canadian curling and can't remember why you opened your laptop.
- How long should a good rabbit hole take?
- Two hours minimum. If you can finish it in 20 minutes it's just an article. The rabbit hole's value is the unexpected turns, which require depth.
- Are Wikipedia chains the same thing?
- Often the entry point, yes. The best rabbit holes start on Wikipedia and end on a 2009 LiveJournal post by a domain expert who never wrote anything else.