Fastest-growing month-on-month in the top 50 was Advance Local-owned New Jersey news site nj.com (23.5 million visits, up 33% month-on-month) while third fastest-growing was Business Utforska unika casinospel Insider (74.4 million, up 21%). It was followed for month-on-month growth in visits by progressive news website Rawstory (20.4 million, up 24%) and Newsweek (up 10% month-on-month). Month-on-month the fastest-growing newsbrand was The Cool Down (24.3 million visits, up 52% compared to January).
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- A candlelit vigil was held on Wednesday night in the remote British Columbia town where six people were killed and dozens injured.
- The black glove found on the roadside near Nancy Guthrie’s Arizona home could hold crucial DNA evidence key to finally unmasking the missing 84-year-old’s kidnapper.
- MSNBC (29.2 million) increased visits by 66%, NBC News (128 million) by 62%, Axios (40 million) by 54% and The Atlantic (28.2 million) by 52%.
- Mark Carney and Pierre Polievre offered condolences after nine people were shot dead in the town of Tumbler Ridge in British Columbia.
- It was followed by UK news site The Independent (up six places with 37.6 million) and the Los Angeles Times (up five places with 28.5 million).
- James Van Der Beek called cancer ‘the best thing that’s ever happened to me’ 2 months before his death
More than half (29) of the 50 biggest news websites in the US saw a month-on-month decline. Substack, now the fourteenth biggest news site in the US, saw the biggest year-on-year boost in visits, up by almost half (42%) to 72.7 million visits in August compared to the same period in 2024. Just five of the top 50 US websites saw year-on-year traffic growth in August 2025, according to the latest data from Similarweb. In August, just five of the top 50 sites had year-on-year growth but in September 18 had an increase in visits compared to a year earlier. Among the biggest month-on-month web traffic declines were also the New York Post (down 15% to 97.7 million visits), followed by Newsweek (67.8 million) and CNN (297.1 million), both down 14%. Just one site among the top ten saw month-on-month growth, with Yahoo Finance (in fourth place) increasing its traffic 10% on September to 145.7 million visits.
The biggest month-on-month increase in June was at The Times of Israel, which saw its visits almost double to 23.7 million in the US (up 98%). The other newsbrands to report month-on-month growth were Newsbreak (up 6%), SFGate (4%), USA Today (3%), and LA Times and India Times (both 1%). Similarly six sites reported month-on-month growth for August, with this hugely increasing to 35 in September.
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The US Sun followed on both growth metrics, up 52% year on year and 59% month on month to 34.9 million visits. In contrast to the annual figures, however, all of the ten biggest sites saw month-on-month growth of at least 3% in January. It was followed by People (161.4 million visits, up 16% year-on-year) and both were the only large sites to see year-on-year growth for the second month in a row. The Independent also featured among the fastest-growing websites year-on-year coming in fifth place having seen visits up 40% compared to last January. It was followed by independently run consumer-focused science news site sciencealert.com (24.4 million visits, up 66% month-on-month). Month-on-month, both Newsweek (up 31% compared to February) and The Cool Down were beaten by publishing group Advance Local’s Alabama-focused site al.com (22.6 million visits, up 67% month-on-month).
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In terms of annual growth Athlon Sports and The Cooldown again topped the charts, with both seeing greater than 300% year-on-year growth. The New York Times extended its lead over CNN has the most popular news website in the US according to Press Gazette’s latest top-50 ranking. The US Sun has been affected by Google’s algorithm changes and reduced the size of its newsroom in September to target fewer key content areas. A third of the top 50 lost traffic year-over-year, with the largest decline seen at the US version of the UK’s un-paywalled Sun tabloid (23 million, down 63.8% year-over-year).
In the broader top 50 both climate news site The Cooldown (25.4 million, up 123.1% month-on-month) and sports news site Athlon Sports (54.1 million, up 38.7%) saw significant growth compared with November. Among the ten most-visited news sites in the US almost every publisher posted traffic gains in January, with the UK-based BBC in particular (125.8 million visits, up 13%) re-entering the top-ten. The California newspaper, which has seen traffic dip in recent months, recorded 42.3 million visitors last month, up 118% compared with December 2024 according to Similarweb. Climate news site The Cooldown (51.6 million visits, up 52%) was the fastest grower month on month, followed by The Atlantic (30.4 million, up 43%). Celebrity news website People and the BBC were the only sites in the USA top ten to post year-on-year traffic growth. The biggest decline among the top ten were at MSN, down 28% year on year and 8% month on month to 168 million visits.
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Further down the rankings The Daily Beast was the highest debuting publication, entering the top 50 at 39th place after seeing traffic rise 22% month-on-month to 30 million. Mail Online remained steady at ninth place with 122.2 million visits while Google News (120.8 million) jumped three places to tenth despite losing 4% of traffic month-on-month, displacing Newsweek (115.7 million) from the top ten. But in August People.com (162.6 million visits) and Yahoo Finance (162.8 million) were the only top ten sites to continue growing their traffic, by 3% and 2% respectively.
February 11, 2026 • The people of Gaza have faced the threat of hunger since the start of the war between Israel and Hamas. February 11, 2026 • Syria’s Jewish community fled the country’s repressive Assad regime. The Syrian government transferred control of Jewish sites in December to Hamra’s Jewish heritage organization. February 12, 2026 • Behind every Ilia Malinin or Alysa Liu, there is an army of elite figure skating coaches and choreographers who have been with them from the beginning. February 12, 2026 • Months after the killing of Charlie Kirk, a growing number of lawsuits by people claim they were illegally punished, fired and even arrested for making negative comments about Kirk.
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