Published by NewsPR Today | August 2025
The BBC’s introduction of a dynamic paywall for American users at the end of June contributed to the July 2025 visitation low for major U.S. news sites for the year. Bbc.com received 100.2 million visits last month, a 15% decrease from June. From July 2024, they fell by 16 percent.
That big drop caused the BBC to fall from seventh to 12th place in July in a ranking of the top 50 U.S. news sites, according to data from the measurement firm SimilarWeb, which provides the chart to CQ Roll Call. The broadcaster charges full access for $8.99 per month or $49.99 per year, although some breaking news features remain free.
In general, more than half of the 50 biggest news sites all saw month-to-month declines. Reuters saw the largest decline in visits at a single site, with U.S. visitors falling 24 percent to 39.3 million. The Associated Press dropped 16 percent to 85.2 million visits. There’s also no shortage of year-over-year comparisons that were negative: Forty-four of the top 50 sites took in fewer visitors in July 2025 than they had drawn in July 2024.
Forbes had the greatest annual loss — its traffic dived 50 percent to 63 million visitors. The Daily Mail declined 44 percent, to 76.8 million visits and both NBC News and HuffPost fell 42 percent.
But there were a few sites that went against the grain. India Times expanded by 46 percent to 26.7 million visits. Substack added 40 percent more readers, with 75.4 million, and Newsbreak was up 24 percent, to 30.4 million. The Times of Israel, which broke into the top 50 for the first time in June with 23.7 million visitors, slipped out again after falling to 12.3 million visitors in July.
Why Traffic Is Down NATIONWIDE
Traffic drops are due to a few trends that are gaining steam. First, AI-based search tools increasingly deliver answers immediately on search results pages, cutting the clutter of users clicking through to publisher sites.
Second, there are more news organizations with paywalls. Even the casual reader faces barriers that inhibit exploration. Third, social platforms have adjusted their algorithms, directing less referral traffic to news publishers than in recent years.
Finally, more and more people are stumbling upon news via mobile apps and in-page content recommendations rather than traditional search.
Market Leaders and Shifting Concentration
Despite the shakeout, a handful of giants continue to dominate. The New York Times was still the most-visited U.S. news site in July, with 462.3 million visits, but that was 7 percent below a year earlier. CNN was next with 323.3 million, a decline of 38 percent. Fox News was third with 249.3 million total visits, a decrease of 26 percent from one year ago.
And as traffic coalesces around the big brands, smaller outlets have to work harder to get attention.
Evolving Discovery and Engagement Strategies
Publishers are testing out a variety of tactics to adjust:
- Forging direct connections through memberships and newsletter subscriptions that bypass social media referrals.
- Planning to invest in apps to bring the news directly to its users’ devices.
- Optimizing headlines, publication time and format using data analytics for maximum engagement.
- Investigating collaborations, like joint reporting projects or shared technical platforms, to distribute costs and reach new audience.
Technical and Economic Pressures
With fewer visits comes less ad revenue, making the financial weight more burdensome for publishers. Prices for programmatic advertising depend on audience size, which means that traffic losses translate directly into lost income.
Meanwhile, search engine and social platform algorithms have both evolved at a torturous pace. To remain visible, sites need to invest in technical performance—improving page load speed, mobile responsiveness, and better search engine optimization (SEO).
The Road Ahead
U.S. publishers are looking to increase international sales to compensate for numbers at home. At the same time, they’re also putting more stock into audience quality metrics, such as subscriptions, time spent on site and newsletter signups compared to just raw page-view counts.
The publishers that make it will have to provide something special, build relationships with readers directly and pivot to adjust to emergent discovery methods fast. Amid the industry’s toughest traffic headwinds in a year, creativity, innovation and resilience have never been more important.
