Healthwatch organisations were set up in England in 2012 by an Act of Parliament to pick up public and patient concerns and views of their local health and care services. There are 150 Healthwatch in England and each local authority must fund a Healthwatch service. Healthwatch use the insights gathered to advise council and NHS leaders about their communities’ needs, to ensure that residents’ views are heard and acted on in decisions about local health and care services. In this podcast series, we talk to people who work in Healthwatch as well as those who’ve followed its journey since 2012. We explore the role of Healthwatch in their local communities and health systems and ask how Healthwatch has responded to the challenges of the COVID-19 pandemic and of major recent changes in the way NHS healthcare is planned and provided. We hope this series will give you an insight into these organisations, which remain largely unknown despite their mission of conveying people’s voices.