Grab Your Popcorn! Here’s Everything You Need To Watch During Shark Week This Year

While last year might have been the 30th anniversary for Shark Week, the Discovery Channel’s long-running celebration of the sea’s apex predator, the lineup for 2019 is here and is already making some serious waves.

When Is Shark Week?

Shark Week 2019 is Sunday, July 28 - Sunday, August 4 on the Discovery Channel. Each day features 24 hours of shark-centric programming, with jaw-dropping premieres kicking off every night at 8 pm Eastern. Learn more about the full Shark Week 2019 schedule here.

What To Watch During Shark Week

1. Shark Week's First Feature-Length Movie

The annual TV event promises more than 20 hours of fresh programming during the shark-centric week. That includes a first for the decades-long franchise: a scripted feature-length film. Capsized: Blood in the Water is the first made-for-Shark-Week movie for the annual summer event. Starring Josh Duhamel and Tyler Blackburn, the film tells the true story of a 1982 incident in which a yacht capsized on the way to Florida, leaving its crew drifting in shark-rich seas for days.

2. The Hunt For Elusive Shark Species

While the movie certainly sounds like a nail-biter, if you prefer to get your adrenaline pumping through reality-based programming, there’s plenty of that, too. This year, shows will take Shark Week hosts around the world in search of some of the most elusive shark species. In Legend of Deep Blue, two experts head to Guadalupe Island in search for what’s believed to be the largest Great White in the world. Over in the Indian Ocean, Extinct or Alive: The Lost Shark will follow a wildlife biologist as he attempts to locate the Pondicherry shark, a rare species last seen in the 1970s.

3. Why Shark Attacks Happen

For those diehard Shark Week devotees, a fan fave is back again this year with more intel into the whys of shark attacks. In Laws of Jaws: Dangerous Waters, four hosts attempt to reenact five recent attacks in an effort to understand how things could have ended differently.

4. Shark Research, News, and Conservation

But not all programming is designed to instill fear. (Statistically, you’re more likely to go being hit by fireworks than at the hands, or mouth, of a shark, after all.) In Sharks Gone Wild 2, viewers can learn about all the things that happened the past year in the world of sharks, including the latest breakthroughs in shark science. And those who want to keep the scientific breakthroughs coming—and support conservation of these vital creatures—can do so stylishly by scoring something from the Vans x Shark Week partnership, where a portion of all proceeds goes directly to Oceana, an organization dedicated to protecting the world’s oceans and its inhabitants.

Now that’s the kind of splash we’re dying to make. Learn more about the full Shark Week 2019 schedule here.

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