Genesis of the Daleks was first broadcast in six weekly parts from 8 March to 12 April 1975. Viewership varied from 8 to 10 million; Parts One and Two were watched by audiences of 10.7 and 10.5 million, Parts Three and Four were watched by audiences of 8.5 and 8.8 million, and Parts Five and Six were watched by audiences of 9.8 and 9.1 million. At the time of broadcast, there were some complaints about the level of violence portrayed.
Mary Whitehouse, of the
National Viewers' and Listeners' Association, complained that
Genesis contained "tea-time brutality for tots". Scenes objected to included the depictions of war and Nyder striking the Doctor. The BBC's Audience Research Report concluded, "A little more complex than some
Doctor Who adventures, perhaps, and with underlying questions of conscience, the serial had been 'different' it was occasionally felt and, although dismissed in some quarters as far-fetched, long drawn-out, confused and/or predictable, had provided acceptable escapist entertainment for the majority."
The A.V. Club reviewer Christopher Bahn noted that it contradicted some aspects of
The Daleks but that it "[hit] the emotional target dead-on". He particularly praised Davros and Skaro, but considered the "major problem" with the portrayal of the Daleks was that "we're not given any choice but to view them as psychopathic murderers", and the Doctor came across as a "catastrophically incompetent secret agent".
DVD Talk's Stuart Galbraith gave
Genesis of the Daleks four out of five stars, calling it a "real fan-pleaser" and writing that Wisher was "superb" as Davros. While noting that the story "is mostly concerned with action and suspense, which it does rather well", he wrote that it "isn't especially original" as it dealt with common time-travel issues, despite doing it in "intelligent ways". In 2009,
SFX listed the scene where the Daleks receive their first blaster as the thirteenth scariest moment of
Doctor Who. The magazine also named the scene where Harry is attacked by a giant clam as one of the silliest
Doctor Who moments, noting "even the best
Doctor Who stories have the occasional dropped stitch".
Charlie Jane Anders of
io9, in a 2010 article, listed the cliffhanger of Episode Four – in which the Doctor is forced to tell Davros how the Daleks will be defeated in the future – as one of the greatest
Doctor Who cliffhangers. Writing for
BFI Screenonline, James Donohue thought
Genesis of the Daleks "shows the series developing a more complex appreciation of the moral issues surrounding being a monster", but "the plot contrives to prevent the Doctor from having to make the difficult decision himself anyway. He delays Davros' plans, but he does not change the future. Lacking the courage to answer the questions it raises,
Genesis shows how challenging, and how infuriating, children's TV can be."
Legacy Genesis of the Daleks is one of the most widely known serials of the original run as it was repeated often. It was edited into an 85-minute omnibus version and broadcast on BBC1 at 3:00 pm on 27 December 1975, attracting 7.6 million viewers, and also was repeated in two edited 45-minute episodes as part of the "Doctor Who and the Monsters" season on 26 July and 2 August 1982, which attracted audiences of 4.9 and 5 million. It was then repeated in its original serial form on
BBC Two in 1993 (averaging 2.2 million viewers) and 2000 (averaging 1 to 1.5 million). In the magazine's 2009 "Mighty 200" poll, asking readers to rank all of the then-made 200 stories,
Genesis came in third place, behind
The Caves of Androzani (1984) and "
Blink" (2007). In a 2014 poll, the magazine's readers again placed the episode in third place. In 2008,
The Daily Telegraph named
Genesis of the Daleks one of the ten greatest episodes of
Doctor Who.
Genesis of the Daleks is the first example in the history of
Doctor Who of "outright revisionism"; the creation story of the Daleks is very different from that established in
The Daleks (1963), where it was said they evolved from creatures known as Dals, who were once similar to the Thals. Here, the Dals from the original story are changed to Kaleds.
Russell T Davies, who revived
Doctor Who in 2005, suggested that the origins of the
Time War, a conflict between the Time Lords and the Daleks which contributed to the storyline of the new series, began with the Time Lords' attempted genocide of the Daleks in
Genesis. Davros is resurrected in
Destiny of the Daleks (1979), played by
David Gooderson, and appears in the remaining three Dalek stories of the classic series played by
Terry Molloy. which saw Miles reprising his role as Nyder in the fourth episode, "Guilt". ==Commercial releases==