As a speciality, anaesthesia has long been a champion of simulation training. But whilst ever increasing numbers of simulation based courses are available, what evidence exists for the proposed advantages of this learning modality? For this podcast Dr Ryan Brydges, an educational academic from the University of Toronto, talks to us about his meta-anaylsis on the topic published in this issue of the BJA. Dr Brydges takes us through the current state of the literature, highlighting the areas and domains where simulation appears to be most useful as an educational tool. Dr Brydges and Dr Thomas discuss outcome metrics, comparators, and explore some of the less intuitive findings with regard to crisis resource management training and high fidelity simulators.