News Media Trends

As election returns rolled in – albeit more slowly than in recent years – Americans were tuning in closely. They also, for the most part, gave their news sources positive marks for the coverage of the returns, though Republicans were less likely to do so than Democrats.

Among the six publicly traded newspaper companies studied, second-quarter advertising revenue fell by a median of 42% year over year.

Though this figure is a sliver of all PPP loans lent out to small businesses as of August, it represents a large segment of U.S. newspaper companies.

About eight-in-ten Americans (79%) say news organizations tend to favor one side when presenting the news on political and social issues.

Videos from independent news producers are more likely to cover subjects negatively and discuss conspiracy theories.

The public is more likely to have heard “a lot” about ongoing confrontations between police and protesters than several other stories.

U.S. adults in this group are less likely to get the facts right about COVID-19 and politics and more likely to hear some unproven claims.

Traffic to digital-native news sites has plateaued in recent years. After rising from 2014 to 2016, it remained steady through 2019.

Those ages 18 to 29 differ from older Americans in their news consumption habits and in their responses to major news events and coverage.

Some 61% of U.S. adults say they follow COVID-19 news at both the national and local level equally, and 23% say they pay more attention to local news.