The country's best-read newspaper

New readership and sales figures confirm the Herald as the country's best-read daily and highest-selling newspaper overall in a market affected by challenging economic conditions.

Nielsen Research figures put average daily readership of the paper for the six months to June 30 at 573,000, down 2.1 per cent from a year earlier - but still bigger than the next three metropolitan dailies combined.

The Weekend Herald, at 613,000, has the highest readership of any New Zealand paper, followed by the Wednesday edition of the Herald and then the nationally distributed Sunday Star-Times.

Strong results were recorded for canvas (up 20,000 readers to 417,000) and the Business Herald, with interest in the global and local recession driving readership up an average of 25,000 a day. The Friday Business Herald liftout reaches 356,000 readers, or four times that of the National Business Review.

Meanwhile, readership of nzherald.co.nz, measured by Nielsen, shows 194,000 people reading it at least once a day in the year to June 30, up from 146,000 a year ago.

Sales of the print edition of the Herald in the latest ABC circulation audit were 174,000 a day, a reduction partly due to less promotional activity on programmes such as the newspapers in schools programme.

The next highest-selling paper is the Sunday Star-Times at 171,000, followed by the Herald on Sunday at 92,315, ahead of the Wellington Dominion Post on 91,500.