Following a surge in growth in February, the Independent was unable to continue the upward trend, recording a drop in online traffic of -12% in March.
The dip equates to a loss of 676,400 unique browsers – yet the title, which ditched print last year, is still looking healthy with almost 5.5 million browsers visiting the platform every day.
The only other notable drops in March were recorded by the Daily Mirror, down almost -6%, and Trinity Mirror’s regional portfolio, down -3%.
Top dog Mail Online was down just -0.6%, but still reins supreme with almost 15.5 million unique daily users.
March was a good month for the Daily Express online which was up 18.5%, adding an extra 300,000 daily browsers.
| Site | March 17 daily average unique browsers | February 17 daily average unique browsers | Actual change | % change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| MailOnline | 15,468,721 | 15,564,992 | -96,271 | -0.62 |
| Trinity Mirror Group – Digital | 8,867,620 | 9,290,626 | -423,006 | -4.55 |
| Mirror Group Nationals | 4,952,835 | 5,263,527 | -310,692 | -5.90 |
| The Independent | 4,796,302 | 5,472,724 | -676,422 | -12.36 |
| The Sun | 4,577,007 | 4,410,613 | 166,394 | 3.77 |
| Trinity Mirror Regional Network | 4,235,714 | 4,367,425 | -131,711 | -3.02 |
| Telegraph | 4,097,621 | 4,069,576 | 28,045 | 0.69 |
| express.co.uk | 1,895,452 | 1,599,442 | 296,010 | 18.51 |
| Metro | 1,730,529 | 1,710,757 | 19,772 | 1.16 |
| dailystar.co.uk | 954,464 | 882,173 | 72,291 | 8.19 |
| Manchester Evening News | 742,021 | 758,367 | -16,346 | -2.16 |
| Evening Standard | 729,459 | 674,830 | 54,629 | 8.10 |
| Liverpool Echo | 524,852 | 531,689 | -6,837 | -1.29 |
| Wales Online | 404,631 | 404,572 | 59 | 0.01 |
| Birmingham Mail | 359,033 | 337,039 | 21,994 | 6.53 |
| Chronicle Live | 270,595 | 254,026 | 16,569 | 6.52 |
| GazetteLive | 140,038 | 126,381 | 13,657 | 10.81 |
| Hull Daily Mail | 130,019 | 138,985 | -8,966 | -6.45 |
| Daily Post (Wales) | 111,147 | 121,509 | -10,362 | -8.53 |
| Nottingham Post | 106,496 | 109,769 | -3,273 | -2.98 |
| Bristol Post | 101,646 | 112,328 | -10,682 | -9.51 |
| Stoke Sentinel | 96,193 | 100,739 | -4,546 | -4.51 |
| Plymouth Herald | 94,962 | 96,390 | -1,428 | -1.48 |
| Derby Telegraph | 92,692 | 80,629 | 12,063 | 14.96 |
| Coventry Telegraph | 89,288 | 85,232 | 4,056 | 4.76 |
| Leicester Mercury | 86,205 | 87,770 | -1,565 | -1.78 |
| Huddersfield Daily Examiner | 74,619 | 79,685 | -5,066 | -6.36 |
| Get Surrey | 63,320 | 72,953 | -9,633 | -13.20 |
| Cambridge News | 58,990 | 51,800 | 7,190 | 13.88 |
| Get Reading | 46,574 | 50,058 | -3,484 | -6.96 |
| Grimsby Telegraph | 41,249 | 43,781 | -2,532 | -5.78 |
| Visiter.co.uk | 14,016 | 13,638 | 378 | 2.77 |
| theguardian.com | na* | na* | na* | na* |
