Social media a more popular news source than newspapers

Rob Clapp

An overview of news reach by platform in the United States between 2016 and 2018.

More American adults get news content via social media than print newspapers, according to the latest data from the Pew Research Center. One-fifth of US adults got their news content often from social media platforms in 2018, compared to just 16% for print newspapers. Print newspapers are now the least used source for receiving news, and prices have doubled since 2008.

TV remains the lead platform for news content but it has recorded consecutive declines in popularity, now below one-half of Americans. News websites have registered the largest growth between 2016 and 2017, although this remained stable at...

WARC subscribers can sign in to keep reading

Not a subscriber?

Schedule your live demo with our team today

WARC helps you to plan, create and deliver more effective marketing

  • Prove your case and back-up your idea

  • Get expert guidance on strategic challenges

  • Tackle current and emerging marketing themes

We’re long-term subscribers to WARC and it’s a tool we use extensively. We use it to source case studies and best practice for the purposes of internal training, as well as for putting persuasive cases to clients. In compiling a recent case for long-term, sustained investment in brand, we were able to support key marketing principles with numerous case studies sourced from WARC. It helped bring what could have been a relatively dry deck to life with recognisable brand successes from across a broad number of categories. It’s incredibly efficient to have such a wealth of insight in one place.

Insights Team
Bray Leino

You’re in good company

We work with 80% of Forbes' most valuable brands* and 80% of the world's top top-of-the-class agencies.

* Top 10 brands