StoryCorps is modeled—in spirit and in scope—after the efforts of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) of the 1930s, through which oral history interviews across the United States were recorded.

Another inspiration for the organization was oral historian Studs Terkel, who cut the ribbon at the opening of StoryCorps' first recording booth in Grand Central Terminal.

With participant permission, a second copy of each interview is archived at the American Folklife Center at the Library of Congress for future generations to hear.

The first StoryBooth opened in New York City's Grand Central Terminal on October 23, 2003, and was moved to Lower Manhattan's Foley Square in July 2005.

[4][5] In May 2005, two StoryCorps MobileBooths built from converted Airstream trailers began traveling the country, recording stories in various cities year-round.

The Door-to-Door service sends teams of StoryCorps facilitators to temporary recording locations throughout the United States for several days at a time.

With the support of the 2015 TED Prize and the 2014 Knight Prototype Fund, StoryCorps has developed a free app that allows users to record interviews on a smartphone.

"[11] Historians are also critical of the post-interview editing process, which they argue favor highly emotional and predictable narrative arcs.

[11] StoryCorps stories typically feature tales of survival, which, as one historian has argued, perpetuates an "interpretive straightjacket of the neoliberal belief that people have their fates in their own hands.

[17] In 2015, Dave Isay won the 2015 TED prize to fulfill his wish for people to have meaningful conversations worldwide using the StoryCorps app.