World Press Trends survey shows major shift in newspaper revenue sources

Global newspaper circulation revenues are larger than newspaper advertising revenues for the first time this century, according to the annual World Press Trends survey released by the World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA).

"This is a seismic shift from a strong business-to-business emphasis – publishers to advertisers – to a growing business-to-consumer emphasis, publishers to audiences," said Larry Kilman, Secretary General of WAN-IFRA, who presented the survey at the 67th World News Media Congress in Washington, D.C. "We can freely say that audiences have become publishers’ biggest source of revenue."

Newspapers generated an estimated US$179 billion in circulation and advertising revenue in 2014. Ninety-two billion dollars came from print and digital circulation, while 87 billion came from advertising.

Source: WAN-IFRA