The paper has reportedly suffered subscription cancellations in recent months after proprietor Patrick Soon-Shiong intervened to block its editorial board from endorsing Kamala Harris in the US presidential election. The Los Angeles Times more than doubled its web traffic month-on-month in January as its home city battled historic wildfires. The other six top-ten sites lost visits, although Fox News (260.5 million) dropped less than a percentage point. The Gateway Pundit, a website that promoted false claims the 2020 US presidential election was stolen, was not far behind, rising 9% month-on-month to 29.5 million. The sharpest month-on-month fall was seen at January’s fastest grower, The Los Angeles Times.
The sites in the list are based on Similarweb’s classification of news and media publishers, although Press Gazette refines the list to exclude some sites with a less journalistic focus. Across the top 50, 11 sites saw year-on-year growth, an improvement from just four seeing an increase in November. Forbes recorded the third highest month-on-month increase in visits, up 15% to 59.3 million. Northern Colorado’s Weld County, one of the fastest growing counties in the state, is looking to evolve their economic diversity in the decades to come.
The Daily Mail remained the best-ranked British newsbrand in the ranking (rank 11, 113 million visits), just ahead of the BBC (rank 12, 106.9 million). Among the wider top 50, The Cool Down, which entered our ranking last month for the first time in 42nd position, saw strong growth for another month, moving up from 42nd to 35th in the table. Celebrity newsbrand People was the fastest-growing news website in the US in March according to Press Gazette’s latest ranking. The Daily Mail remained the best-ranked British newsbrand in the ranking (rank 11, 115.4 million visits), pulling further ahead of the BBC (rank 13, 106.1 million), which fell one place from twelfth in March. Those that declined only saw small traffic drops with People (down 4% compared to March) and Washington Post (117 million, also down 4%) seeing the largest drops. Month-on-month New York Post (149.4 million, up 7%), USA Today (up 3%) and MSN (263.2 million, up 2%) were fastest-growing.
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But the picture is rosier over a longer timespan, with three-quarters of the top 50 publishers seeing year-on-year growth in visits in August. The two top ten sites to see year-on-year traffic declines were Fox News (down 0.7%) and Mail Online, where visits dropped 7.2%. New top ten entrant Forbes was also the fastest-growing site in the group, seeing visits rise 48% compared with September 2023.
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Mail Online (136.1 million) gains a place, rising to ninth, and Newsweek (133.3 million) leaps from 16th to tenth place. The figures for July are the first Press Gazette has published since Similarweb updated its data model. The site received 374% more visits in August 2024 than in August 2023, reaching 29.6 million. It was followed by UK news site The Independent (up six places with 37.6 million) and the Los Angeles Times (up five places with 28.5 million).
Fox News saw the biggest slump at 14% with visits down to 249.9 million despite a busy Turkey news cycle in the US with national elections later this year. Instead fastest-growing was M Live (up 27% month-on-month), followed by CBS News (84 million, up 26%), Axios (up 21%), and technology specialist The Verge (up 17%). Newsweek continued a strong run of growth to retake its spot as the fastest-growing news website in the US in April, according to Press Gazette’s latest ranking. CNN (419.2 million visits, up 3%) and the New York Times (503.4 million, up 3%) also saw growth, albeit more modest, compared to April. Visits to the popular magazine’s website were up 18% month-on-month to 165.3 million, according to data from digital intelligence platform Similarweb.
The New York Times remains the most-visited news site in the US, followed by CNN (351.5 million) and Fox News (272.8 million). The AP’s consumer-facing website has seen “a lot of audience growth” since it relaunched in June 2023. It was followed by India Times (26.8 million visits, up 82% year-on-year), one of several Indian publishers to climb up the rankings in the past year. Other notable month-on-month gainers included Axios (32.3 million, up 33%), CNBC (113.2 million, up 30%), Newsweek (96.6 million, up 25%) and Zero Hedge (26.3 million, up 13%). The news agency was banned from presidential media briefings after refusing to rename the Gulf of Mexico the Gulf of America and a legal dispute is continuing.
Newsweek was followed by Axios (25 million visits, up 88% year-on-year) and Politico (50.7 million, up 51%). Visits to People.com were up 27% year-on-year to reach 145.7 million, according to data from digital intelligence platform Similarweb. The remainder of the top ten either declined year-on-year or in the case of the New York Times (up 1%) and the New York Post (down 1%) registered virtually no change in traffic. Since November Similarweb has excluded the figures for edition.cnn.com in its report to Press Gazette since they are counted under the main domain. AP News (98.8 million, up 21%) and Variety (43.8 million, up 19%) also saw growth of over or close to a fifth.
- City council recently approved a budget appropriation of over $760,000 for onboarding expenses and salaries for the new firefighters.
- But the picture is rosier over a longer timespan, with three-quarters of the top 50 publishers seeing year-on-year growth in visits in August.
- The most notable result of the change appears to be that it has bounced CNN (525 million visits) ahead of The New York Times (385.7 million) to retake the top spot on the traffic ranking.
- At the other end of the list however, Microsoft news aggregator MSN (247.4 million visits) and News Corp’s New York Post (124.9 million) saw the biggest year-on-year slumps at 17% each.
- Among the biggest month-on-month web traffic declines were also the New York Post (down 15% to 97.7 million visits), followed by Newsweek (67.8 million) and CNN (297.1 million), both down 14%.
The biggest riser already on the charts was progressive news site Raw Story, which climbed eight spots to 37th place on the back of a 24% month-on-month traffic increase to 33.2 million. The contraction is particularly pronounced among the top ten US news sites by traffic, where eight publishers saw visits drop compared to July. Going the opposite direction, however, was the US outpost of fellow British publisher The Sun (22.2 million visits), which dropped 15 places to 50th on the back of 34.9% month-on-month and 65.1% year-on-year traffic declines. Athlon Sports (up 218.4% year-on-year to 35 million) was the fastest riser in the ranks of the top 50, jumping eight places to 33rd on the back of 18% month-on-month traffic growth, the second most growth of any publisher in the top 50. Also possibly reflecting interest in the US presidential election, the fastest monthly growth among the top 50 was seen at Real Clear Politics, where visits were up nearly 40% compared with September. Among the broader top 50 news sites in the US, sports news site athlonsports.com (34.7 million) continued its reign as the fastest-growing publisher, nearly quadrupling its web visits compared to October 2023.
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