The 2026 Digital News Report reveals that people worldwide are increasingly using social media, video networks, and chatbots for news consumption, abandoning traditional news sites and apps, with platforms like Facebook and Instagram seeing a resurgence in news engagement.

Worldwide, including Spain, South Korea, U.K., U.S., Asia, Africa, Latin America, Southern and Eastern Europe, Kenya, Netherlands, Germany, Nigeria, Finland, Italy, Slovakia, Serbia, Thailand, Peru

Who

Oxford’s Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism (RISJ), Andrew Deck, Laura Hazard Owen, Craig T. Robertson, Neel Dhanesha, Nic Newman, Richard Fletcher, Sophie Culpepper, Rasmus Kleis Nielsen, Jim Egan

What

When

Mon, 15 Jun 2026 23:02:00 GMT · 3h 54m ago

Where

Worldwide, including Spain, South Korea, U.K., U.S., Asia, Africa, Latin America, Southern and Eastern Europe, Kenya, Netherlands, Germany, Nigeria, Finland, Italy, Slovakia, Serbia, Thailand, Peru ·

Why

People are attracted to social media and chatbots for news due to features like interactivity, ability to ask follow-up questions, summarization of complex stories, and translation, while also consuming long-form video content on platforms like YouTube.

The Frontline Impact

How this affects you

The shift away from news websites and traditional media towards social platforms, video, and AI chatbots fundamentally changes news distribution and audience discovery, posing significant challenges for news organizations, as fewer users are paying for news and engagement with publisher-owned platforms is declining across age groups.

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Verified Sources & Citations

Nieman Lab
https://www.niemanlab.org/2026/06/news-sites-are-the-new-newspapers-people-are-abandoning-them-for-social-media/
HIGH

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