Old British Media Also Losing Ground To Digital

Newspapers have become the least popular medium people use to keep up to date with news and current affairs, according to new research from Ofcom.

Ofcom’s annual news consumption study found that 31% of the population read a printed newspaper to keep informed, a significant fall from the 41% who said the same thing last year.

The sharp fall means that printed newspapers are now the least popular medium for checking news, behind radio (32%), the internet (41%) and television (67%).

While television remains by some distance the most popular medium, it too saw a significant fall from 75% last year to 67% in the current report.

The Guardian reports there was also a decrease in the popularity of radio as a source of news with the proportion of people doing so falling from 36% to 32% year-on-year.

The fall in people using traditional forms of media to keep up with the news was accompanied by an increase in people using mobiles to stay up to date, from 21% to 25%, and a significant jump in those saying they got their news via word of mouth, from 11% to 14%.

The report unsurprisingly reflects the increase in popularity of going to digital sources for news, especially among younger demographics.

Around half of 16-to-24-year-olds use TV for news, falling to just 21% for newspapers and 23% for radio.

However, 59% of 16-to-24-year-olds said they go online to check news.