NRS national newspaper round-up: July 13 – June 14

The latest NRS national newspaper figures paint a bleak picture for print, with all but one title recording declines in readership between July 2013 and June 2014.

Only the ‘i’ newspaper managed to record any growth, up 7.2% – an extra 39,000 readers.

However, the title’s sister publication, The Independent, was hardest of any newsbrand, down a substantial -34.3%, losing 136,000 readers.

The Guardian was also hit hard, down -20% and losing 187,000 readers, whilst The Times dropped -151,000 (-12%).

The Daily Telegraph was down 87,000 readers during the period, a -6.5% drop.

The Financial Times no longer submits data to the NRS, making any period-on-period data impossible. Circulation figures, however, can be found in Newsline’s coverage of ABC results.

In the mid-market, the Daily Mail was down -10.1%, dropping a substantial 432,000 readers. However, the newspaper is still the second best read title in the entire market and has an average readership of nearly 4.3 million.

The Daily Express was down only -2.3%, dropping 26,000 and securing a little over one million daily readers.

In the popular market, the Daily Mirror was struck with a -19.6% drop in readership – shedding 545,000 readers to secure a little over 2.2 million readers.

However, in terms of pure volume, the Sun lost the most readers – across all newsbrands – recording a drop of 927,000 readers (-14.4%). The title remains in rude health, however, and is the UK’s most popular newspaper with more than 5.5 million daily readers.

Elsewhere in the popular market, the Daily Star was down -14.2% (-172,000 readers) and the Daily Record was down 11.1% (-85,000 readers).

All Sunday titles were down between July 2013 and June 2014.

In the quality market the Independent on Sunday was hardest hit in terms of percentage change. The publication was down -18.2% and lost 87,000 readers.

However, it was the Sunday Times that shed the most readers after recording a -10.9% drop. With a total readership of 2.3 million, the title shed 277,000 readers over the period – but remains the most popular title amongst its rivals.

Elsewhere, the Observer was down -17.8% and lost 168,000 readers. The title now has 778,000 pairs of eyes scanning its pages each Sunday.

The Sunday Telegraph, in second place with a little over 1.3million readers, was down only -3.5%, dropping 47,000 readers.

In the mid-market, The Sunday Express lost 52,000 readers, whilst the Sunday Post dropped 53,000, changes of -4.7% and -8.1%, respectively.

The Mail on Sunday meanwhile – still the second most popular Sunday title – was down only -8.7%, but this translates as a loss of more than 400,000 readers. The title now records a total audience of 4.2 million.

In the popular market, Sunday People witnessed the biggest fall of any title, down -25.6%, losing 231,000 readers.

Meanwhile, despite the Sun on Sunday dropping by over 909,000 over the period – the largest drop of any Sunday paper – it continues to lead the ranks of all the titles with an average readership of almost 4.8 million.

The Sun on Sunday’s rival, the Sunday Mirror, dropped 10.9%, losing 304,000 readers and now has almost 2.5 million readers.