Herald's readership hits new high

Herald readership online and in print has reached a new high of 818,000 a day. Herald on Sunday readership in Auckland now exceeds its two rivals combined. Photo / Richard Robinson

Readership of the Herald on nzherald.co.nz and in print has reached a new high of 818,000 on average a day.

Latest Nielsen research figures show the combined brand audience for the Herald jumped by 54,000 from a year ago. Across a week, 1.33 million people now engage with the Herald in print and online.

The daily print edition is the best-read newspaper in the country, with 566,000 readers aged 15 and over on an average day, more than twice as many as any other metropolitan paper and more readers every day than the nationwide paper the Sunday Star Times.

The Weekend Herald is the single best read paper in the country, with 603,000 on an average Saturday.

And the Herald on Sunday is up again, by 11,000 to 394,000, with its Auckland readership more than its two rivals combined.

The HOS has also had a standout result in the separate figures released today for circulation, or paid sales, by the Audit Bureau of Circulation. It hit 101,711, a rise of 680 a week. Its competitor, the Star-Times fell more than 10,000 copies a week to 143,000 and Sunday News by almost 4000 to 44,031.

The daily Herald's circulation falls by just 630 papers on average to stay above 170,000 for the seventh audit in a row.

nzherald.co.nz is also enjoying strong audience growth, with monthly UBs increasing by 11 per cent over the year ending March. There has also been growth in the time people spend with content on the site, with engagement time increasing by 5 per cent.