Americans Following The News Less Closely

A new Pew Research Center analysis of surveys from 2016 to 2022 finds that a declining share of Americans say they have been following the news closely.

Key findings include:

• The share of U.S. adults who say they follow the news all or most of the time fell from 51% in 2016 to 38% in 2022, the last time we asked this question.
• A rising share of Americans say they follow the news only "now and then." While 12% of adults said this in 2016, that figure increased to 19% by 2022. And while 5% said in 2016 that they hardly ever follow the news, 9% said the same last year.
• In 2016, 57% of Republicans and independents who lean Rep­­ublican said they followed the news all or most of the time. In the 2022 survey, 37% said the same, a decrease of 20 percentage points. By comparison, the share of Democrats and Democratic leaners who say this dropped by only 7 points, from 49% to 42%.