Fairfax continues to edge ahead in digital subscriptions

By AdNews | 16 May 2014
 

Latest ABC data contained few surprises. Print newspaper circulation continues to decline. Digital subscriptions continue to grow, albeit more slowly than many publishers would like.

In terms of overall sales, The Age weekday and Saturday editions, The Australian, The Sun Herald, The Sunday Age, The Sydney Morning Herald weekday and Saturday editions, all experienced total masthead year-on-year growth.

The Australian Financial Review's print only sales fell 6.4% across the week day edition, with the weekend edition of the paper falling 23.1%. The paper currently doesn't provide its digital numbers for audit.

Digital subscritions haven't yet stemed decline for the The Herald Sun. Total masthead sales for the weekday Herald Sun fell 6%, the Saturday edition falling 6.8% and the Sunday Herald Sun falling 7.3% year-on-year.

The Weekend Australian also fell 4.3% in total masthead numbers.

The biggest increases in digital sales came from the Fairfax papers with The Sydney Morning Herald's digital numbers increasing by 183% year on year. The paper's paid digital subscribers are now higher than its paid print sales.

It's the same story with The Age, which experienced 185.2% digital sales growth, taking its total digital subscriptions to 118,031 while its print sales fell to 78,996.

According to analysis from Fusion Strategy, on a volume basis, almost a third of Farfax's total paid subscriptions are now digital. News Corp's total percentage of digital subscriptions sits at 6.68%.

The decline in News Corp's overall print business at 8.99% is less steep than Fairfax's 13.36%

The Age's weekday print sales fell most steeply of the major papers, down almost 18%. The Sydney Morning Herald's weekday edition fell by 14.5%.  Bar the Australian, the AFR, the Daily Telegraph and the West Australian most of the larger papers recorded double digit declines.

 

See the Fusion tables below.

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