Online Newspapers In The U.K. Attract Large Global Audience

Nearly 16 million people in the U.K. visited a newspaper web site in March, representing a 43-percent reach of the country’s online population, according to comScore.

The Sun Online was the most popular online newspaper in the U.K. during the month, growing 8 percent year-over-year to 4.6 million visitors. The Guardian ranked second with 4.3 million visitors, followed by the Telegraph (3.9 million visitors), the Mail Online (3.5 million visitors) and the Times Online (3 million visitors). The majority of the top ten newspaper sites reached double-digit growth compared to a year ago, including Metro, which grew 75 percent to rank as the fastest-growing.

While Online U.K. newspapers attract a significant domestic audience, most draw even larger international audiences. Specifically, the Mail online received 73 percent of its global audience from outside of the U.K., followed by FT.com (67%), and Metro (61 %). Even Thisislondon, the website of London-focused newspaper the Evening Standard, received 48 percent of its total traffic from outside the country.

"Traditional U.K. newspaper brands have proven to be very popular online, both here in the U.K. and around the world," said Mike Read, SVP and Managing Director, comScore Europe.

"Whether or not these titles choose to switch to subscription-based models, at the possible expense of audience attrition, remains to be seen. However, we can be certain that the online medium has enabled U.K. newspapers to attract substantial incremental readership from other countries – audiences that were not nearly as accessible in the days of print-only publications."