Ed Ou is an Emmy and Peabody Award-winning staff visual journalist with Reuters, documentary filmmaker and cinematographer.

He covers breaking news, investigations and in-depth reporting across multiple continents, with a focus on human centred storytelling. His work spans documentary video, still photography and visual investigations, often combining field reporting with open-source analysis.

He began his career in Jerusalem, reporting across the Middle East, the Horn of Africa and Central Asia during a period of profound political and social change. Working for The Associated Press and Getty Images Reportage, he documented refugees fleeing Somalia to Yemen by boat, survivors of Soviet-era nuclear testing in Kazakhstan, political upheaval in Kyrgyzstan, the U.S.-led war on terror and its impact across the region, and communities navigating life amid conflict in Lebanon, Gaza and Iraq.

He later worked with The New York Times, where he covered East Africa and the Middle East during the Arab Spring, including youth-led protests in Egypt, the civil war in Libya, the Maidan uprising in Ukraine, Russia's annexation of Crimea and the early years of the war in eastern Ukraine, while contributing to both the newspaper's photo report and its early video journalism.

He subsequently moved to New York to join NBC News, where he led long-form documentary projects, helped build video teams and spearheaded special reporting initiatives. His work examined extremism and political division in the United States, immigration, racial justice protests, policing and public health, the aftermath of gun violence in communities across the country, the opioid crisis, and Indigenous communities confronting climate change in the Canadian Arctic.

His reporting has also documented civilians enduring winter blackouts following Russian airstrikes on Ukraine's power grid, families attempting to leave Gaza for medical treatment abroad, the refugee crisis in the Mediterranean, and human rights abuses in global supply chains, including reporting aboard Chinese distant-water fishing fleets operating in the far reaches of the South Atlantic.

His work has been published and broadcast worldwide by outlets including National Geographic, CNN, BBC, VICE, Al Jazeera English, The New Yorker, ProPublica, The Guardian and Netflix.

His documentaries have been awarded a Peabody, two Alfred I. duPont–Columbia University Awards, International Reporting Awards from the Overseas Press Club, a Canadian Screen Award, and a team Edward. R Murrow award, among others.

His photojournalism has been recognised by multiple World Press Photo Awards, a Global Vision Award, World Understanding Award, Documentary Journalism Awards, and multiple Photographer of the Year Awards from POYi.

He has been selected for a Getty Images Editorial Grant, PDN 30 Under 30, and took part in the World Press Photo Joop Swart Masterclass. He was also awarded the City of Perpignan Young Reporter Award at Visa Pour L'Image and the Young Reporter Prize from the Prix Bayeux-Calvados Award for War Correspondents.

He is a TED Senior Fellow.