While overall newspaper readership through the week may appear similar for different age demographics (from 83% to 87%) there are significant differences in how each group accesses news content by platform.
It is no surprise that Millennials prefer to do everything, including reading news content, on their phones. It is also no surprise that Boomers love to read their printed newspaper. But no matter the demographic, digital has not fully replaced printed newspaper consumption, but supplemented it.
Recent research from the Media Technology Monitor (MTM) also finds significant differences in technology use between Boomers and Millennials in their Through the Ages report. This report finds that Boomers over-index on desktop computer usage, the majority read news online and social media usage (mostly Facebook and LinkedIn) declines as Boomers age. More than two thirds of Boomers also own smartphones and they are more likely to own tablets.
As expected, smartphones are the device of choice for Millennials at 94% ownership. Millennials are also more likely to own smart TV’s but 21% have no TV subscription so it makes sense that they are the highest users on online TV (Netflix, Crave, Amazon Video).
News Media Canada’s research on readership by platform and time of day can be downloaded here.