It’s no secret that we’re living in a digital age, but a recent tube journey brought the pace of change into sharp focus. Of the 11 people in my section of the carriage, six were on their mobile phones. This was an environment where historically you’d get no coverage, where people would be reading books or staring absently into space trying desperately not to catch the eye of the person opposite, where it was not uncommon to find at least one copy of The Metro in every carriage no matter the time of day.

This experience got me thinking. As connectivity reaches even these previously offline moments, moments that news brands like The Metro have relied on to capture our attention, how do traditional publishers adapt to an increasingly online world? More importantly, what does that mean for us as advertisers?

The Ofcom News Report 2026 published last month tells us that 96% of all UK adults consume news, highlighting just how huge its reach and scale is. However, a much broader range of platforms are now being used to access news, beyond printed newspapers. The news landscape, much like every other media channel, is becoming increasingly fragmented.

It’s not surprising that 82% of adults access their news online, with nearly three-quarters using online intermediaries such as social media and news aggregators. However, only 5% of those that use intermediaries rely solely on them for their news. Encouragingly for news brands, 57% of adults access news directly through news publishers’ websites and apps. Social media need not be the enemy of news brands, particularly amongst young audiences as many use these services as a gateway to their news consumption.

What does this all mean for advertisers?

These changing audience behaviours create a broader set of opportunities than traditional print placement alone. Publisher websites and apps can offer access to loyal, logged-in audiences. Video-led formats can deliver attention and storytelling. And social distribution can extend reach to younger news brand consumers. The opportunity is not simply to follow audiences onto new platforms, but to choose the combination of environment, format and publisher relationship that best serves the campaign objective. Reach may come from distributed channels, while trust, context and deeper engagement may be strongest in publisher-owned spaces. The ultimate question for advertisers is not whether news audiences are disappearing, but where and how they are choosing to engage.