The latest figures from the National Readership Survey show huge growth in monthly reach for national newspaper titles.
Most of the growth appears to be coming from mobile devices, although the year on year comparisons are boosted by a change in the NRS methodogy which is said to have pulled in more mobile readers.
The readership estimates are based on nationwide survey conducted throughout the year and on digital data provided by Comscore for November 2015.
According to NRS most national newspaper websites now have double the number readers on mobile devices that they do on desktop computers. The NRS claims that the Mirror has nearly four times as many readers on mobile as desktop.
The Daily Mail is the most read national newspaper in print and online according to the NRS, with a monthly reach of nearly 29m people said to be reading it at least once a month either in print or online.
The Telegraph has overtaken the Mirror to take second place, both on 26m, followed by The Guardian on 25m.
The figures illustrate the extent to which the paywall was limiting the Sun’s audience.
It had the highest reach of any title in print at the end of 2015. But when digital is taken into consideration The Sun’s reach was half of that of the Telegraph and the Mirror and lower than the Independent and the Express.
UK national newspaper monthly audience reach Dec 2015 (source NRS)
| Title | Net print, PC and mobile 2015 | Net print, PC and mobile 2015 | Total print Jan-Dec 2015 | Total PC Nov 2015 | Total mobile Nov 2015 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 000s | 000s | 000s | 000s | 000s | |
| Daily Mail / dailymail.co.uk | 28870 | 24449 | 10171 | 9033 | 19348 |
| The Daily Telegraph / telegraph.co.uk | 26274 | 16357 | 3823 | 9100 | 19115 |
| Daily Mirror / mirror.co.uk | 26116 | 17484 | 6035 | 5339 | 19400 |
| The Guardian / theguardian.com | 24710 | 16314 | 4059 | 8822 | 18287 |
| Metro / metro.co.uk | 20220 | 14211 | 10528 | 2738 | 11900 |
| The Independent / independent.co.uk | 19375 | 10442 | 2290 | 5262 | 14718 |
| The Sun / thesun.co.uk | 13750 | 13628 | 11210 | 1782 | 2330 |
| Daily Express / express.co.uk | 11412 | 6839 | 2716 | 2503 | 7289 |
| London Evening Standard / standard.co.uk | 9980 | 6718 | 5267 | 1851 | 5102 |
| Daily Star / dailystar.co.uk | 6782 | N/A | 2536 | 915 | 3883 |
| The Times / thetimes.co.uk | 5010 | 4911 | 4442 | 394 | 531 |
| Daily Record / dailyrecord.co.uk | 3938 | 2978 | 1173 | 719 | 2763 |
| The Scotsman / scotsman.com | 1907 | 1252 | 345 | 554 | 1225 |
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