Newspapers began life in Europe in the early 1600s. Although centuries before the printing press, an idea of a daily paper circulated in Rome, and China had imperial bulletins for bureaucrats in 200 BC. Soon, this idea of newspapers reached England and then the colonies, US. Over time, with the growth of newspapers, the larger questions of news and freedom of press got refined, debated and sharpened.
But newspapers in the relatively current modern form began in the 1800s when they became cheap for the average person. With industrial revolution, giant presses (with 10,000 papers printed an hour) allowed for a high growth – resulting in some newspapers reaching over a million circulation by 1890.
This media has been going through shifts of its own over the last century with the advent of radio and TV, but more recently, at least in the developed world, there is big change – more and more people are heading to digital news rather than the printed newspapers.
The objective of this note is to make sense or contextualise newspaper circulation around the world.
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According to WPT Outlook, overall global paying newspaper audience is 561 million, with 517 million being print audience.
Perhaps a way to grapple with the circulation numbers would be to get a sense in few major markets across the world. Each market is quite different. For instance, although highly declining in terms of print circulation, US is still the largest market in dollar terms. Japan is one of the biggest (though declining) markets in terms of the sheer numbers of newspapers sold in proportion to its population. A stand out market is India with increasing number of circulation as well as publications. China has had its own growth spurt late in 20th century. And at some point, a Russian newspaper had over 33 million circulation.
Here is a quick look at some countries:
USA
At its peak in 1980s, US had ~64 million average circulation of newspapers. Even in 2005, it was over 50 million. Until recently, this number was close to 40 million. At the moment, it is closer to 20 million. It is a dramatic shift of sorts.
In terms of print circulation, Wall Street Journal is the largest US newspaper with ~500k circulation. This number was over 1 million a few years ago (2018). Now although there is a decline of printed newspaper, the total subscription (digital + print) for WSJ has gone up to 4.2 million compared to 2.6 million in 2018.
The next highest printed circulation is New York Times in the US with ~250k print subscribers. But it is the largest paywalled news website in the world in terms of total paid subscribers with 9.4 million subscribers. The New York times has a revenue of ~$1.81 billion.
Although in terms of circulation numbers, US has a small global share, but it is one of the largest market in terms of dollar value of the industry. The US market is around ~USD 20 billion in revenue. Of this, circulation revenue was ~55% until recently. The rest being advertisement revenue. In 2022, the advertising revenue was ~USD 9.5 billion. This is an interesting number in the context of the fact that newspaper advertising used to be ~USD 50 billion during early 2000s (just before sub-prime). This points to the revenue structure of the US print newspaper industry too – advertising constituted a bulk of revenue until some time back (82% in 2005) – this was quite different to the rest of the world.
So the US market has changed shape not just in terms of declining number of papers, declining print circulation but the revenue structure of the industry has witnessed a massive shift in the last decade or so. Even out of the total advertising revenue, now digital advertising accounted for ~50% of revenue. With rapidly declining print subscribers, increasing digital subscribers (~22% of the country pays for online news), revenue is not keeping pace resulting in a shrinking industry size.
In terms of total newspapers circulated, US has 6,000 newspapers, of which ~1200 dailies. Since 2005, ~3,000 newspapers have closed down in the US. In the same period, the total newspaper employment has reduced by 70%. Not just in distribution and support, but even the newsroom employment has fallen by over 50%.
Another pointer to appreciate the overall Newsmedia industry (newspapers, magazines, news channels, radio) is that contribution of advertisement as media revenue is perhaps highest in newspapers. For Local TV news, advertisements contribute ~20%. As an absolute number too, advertising revenue is highest in printed newspapers. And so is audience revenue. (Pointing to paid news access)
Japan
In Japan, the total newspaper print circulation is ~29 million (population of 123 million). Contrast this with US, 20 million print circulation for a population of 346 million. The circulation of newspapers in Japan is perhaps the highest in per capita basis (after Iceland) – with around ~400 newspapers per 1000 population. The total circulation is Japan used to be ~55 million in 2000 and it stayed relatively flat until 2009. Until 2018, this was at 40 million. It is only recently that the rate of decline has sped up.
Some of the world’s largest circulating newspapers are from Japan. The world’s largest circulating newspaper Yomiuri Shimbun has over 6.6 million circulation. (At a point in late 90s, its circulation was over 10 million) The next highest, Asahi Shimbun is close to 4 million printed. Perhaps it refers to the shape of the country as well, with Tokyo itself housing 37 million people. (One would think US has more distributed population allowing for a greater number of newspapers). Perhaps another light here is the number of newspapers circulating in Japan. Where US has close to 1200 dailies, Japan with a much higher printed circulation has close to 121 dailies. The five largest newspapers in Japan account for over 50% of circulation.
In terms of dollar size of the market, unlike the US, Japan has had a large proportion of revenue coming in from subscription income. The total revenue of newspapers is ~USD 8.7 billion – 9 billion. Around 70% of this is subscription income. Both subscription and advertising revenue have fallen over the last decade but advertising income has faced a bigger reduction. Digital ads have come up as a new revenue stream but does not make up for the significant fall in print advertising revenue. The total revenue used to be ~USD 12 billion in 2012.
Another relevant feature of the Japanese market is its relative disinclination for digital news. In terms of digital, against 21% of US consumers paying for online news, the number in Japan is one of the lower in developed nations, at 9%.
India
Where most of the developed world faces declining circulation, India circulation numbers are rising. Given greater literacy, and the factor that national news media (TV etc) does not capture the local market very well, people rely on local newspapers. The total circulated numbers are 232 million as reported early in 2024. This was around ~3% increase over the previoys year. This is the number of dailies. In terms of sheer number of printed newspapers circulated, this is the largest market. If one were to count weeklies, fortnightlies etc, all publication, the number is closer to 400 million average circulation. It is also a diverse market in terms of languages, for example:
Hindi : 4,496 publications, 107.9 million daily circulation. Largest newspaper in Hindi is Dainik Jagran with 3.5 million circulation
English: 811 publications, 22 million daily circulation. Largest newspaper is Times of India with ~1.8 million circulation making it the largest printed English publication in the world (over different editions).
Urdu: 1,123 publications, 20 million daily circulation.
Telugu: 1078 publications, 13.8 million daily circulation.
And several other local languages.
Despite the volume, the revenue size of the industry is still close to USD 3 billion, way smaller than the developed world newspaper sectors. Ad revenue constitutes 75% of this revenue.
So perhaps in India, newspapers are still not that big in terms of revenue numbers, but the sheer numbers of circulation make them big on influence.
China
I could not find the latest number of newspaper circulated in China, but in 2020, it was ~117 million.
China has had a different trajectory of newspapers from the rest of the world. In 1968, there were only 42 newspapers in China, which grew to around 2200 in 2005. In 2022, this was around 1700.
The largest newspaper is China daily with 900,000 circulation (of which 600,000 is overseas).
In terms of large countries of the world, China is not really a free country for media/press. News outlets from overseas which are not state-owned are banned in China, websites are blocked, restricted access to frequencies.
The revenue of the newspaper publishing industry in China is close to USD 8.8 billion.
Other countries
Russia – I list Russia here simply to mention that at a time, one of its newspapers had a print run of 33.5 million. (Argument I Fakty in 1990). At the moment, the circulation is close to 2.9 million (?). The total circulation of newspapers in Russia was around 3.5 million in 2023. This number had come down from 9.5 million a decade ago.
UK – One of the oldest places in the world in terms of number of newspapers, it is interesting because realising the “negative narrative of decline”, some UK newspapers have declined sharing circulation numbers since 2020. Since 1950s, a regular decline, and by 2014, no UK newspaper had more than 2 million circulation. By 2023, perhaps no UK paper had more than 1 million circulation. The total printed newspapers circulating is below 5 million, and the industry has changed shape in terms of revenue (loss of advertising revenue), consolidation and the number of people employed by the industry.
Germany – The total printed newspaper circulation in Germany is ~10.2 million. This used to be 27.3 million in 1991.
Industry revenue
When we talk about newspaper revenue, there is subscription revenue and advertisement revenue. At some point in their lives, before the rise of internet, classifieds were an important part of newspapers and their revenue.
The global newspaper/ print media industry is ~USD 150 billion per one source (Statisa) but perhaps it combines magazine revenue as well. As per another source (WAN-IFRA from PWC), overall revenue from circulation, advertising and other sources was close to USD 127 billion in c.2023. It is still larger than the book publishing, music publishing, films industry. For context, the movies industry in 2023 was around ~USD 100 billion. The total Entertainment and Media industry of which newspaper form one part is around USD 2.8 trillion. (Perhaps for another post, how the shape of this industry has changed and evolved over time)
Since the key sources of revenue for newspapers is advertising and subscription, perhaps another way to consider the industry is to consider its share in the total advertising industry. In 2023, global advertising was close to USD 917 billion Of this, the largest spend was on online advertising. Print advertising was a small sliver ~3% of the total global advertising spend. But increasingly, digital ads also contribute to newspapers, perhaps another 3% of global advertising spend.
Although there is a significant shift away from print, still, print constitutes 80% of the newspaper revenue (FIPP) between subscription and advertising.
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Closing notes
For me, a key few things that stand out:
- Reducing print subscription – shifting reading habits. (Perhaps a bigger impact than radio and news channels had on printed paper). Does it change what we see too? Not trying to reveal my stance, yet one has to consider the fluid algorithms of digital/subjectivity rather than the objective detached print. Here from VisualCapitalist:
“Digital news only makes this worse, utilizing algorithms designed to keep a person’s eyes on the page longer, pushing stories with narratives a person shows interest in, and often taking them down a rabbit hole of fringe information—sometimes towards the extremes.”
- The size of the industry is so disparate across the world. Perhaps another indicator to the differences between the developed and developing world, in many ways similar, yet so dissimilar and disparate. Questions of the valuation of currency to what they say parity. Lives are different in these regions.
- Newspapers in terms of revenue are still the highest advertised in news media form. For the longevity of printed matter. Also, there is a factor of readership. A printed newspaper is assumed to have more than 1 reader. And hence digital subscriptions and print subscriptions are not directly comparable.
- Perhaps a question that opens here is the changing shape of media itself over the last 100-150 years. The increasing share of entertainment and tech in what was traditionally the media sector. Changes of definition, perception. But if the day still has 24 hours and the audience is still the same, it is the change of the way of life that it shows. Perhaps life is being taken away from the not-measured, non-revenue time to more and more measured and revenue/paying/subscribing times. Be it physical comforts, home tech stuff, to the share of mindspace.
- One of the other thread to pursue is perhaps the concentration of ownership of the highest circulating newspapers/ news media channels. And perhaps worth considering the case study or trajectory of a newspaper itself over time. Also, press freedom and profit motives of a corporate owner, about media and democracy. To be perhaps considered in the larger evolving landscape of all news (newspapers, radio, TV news, digital).
- Another hypothesis -in the developed world, increase in less frequent (say weekly) newspapers rather than dailies. (In America, in 2015, there were four times more weeklies than dailies – number of papers). This seems to address the benefits of print but letting the consumer consume news through instant digital/news channels. But perhaps letting the less frequent printed newspaper still guide deep thinking opinions (?)
- And not completely unrelated, but still a tangent – about the proportion of unedited information now available to a person – perhaps this has increased significantly for the more connected people. For those still reliant on print or newspapers, or newschannels, there is an access to considered, vetted, edited information. There is a question of what is news, and what is opinion. And at least the opinion is marked so and is coming from a trusted source. Perhaps this question extends to the evolution of editing function itself over time.
PS – Found this BBC Country reports. Each country guide shares a media guide about the country too. Link