This is the 10th edition of the Digital news report: Australia. To mark the occasion, the News and Media Research Centre has compiled a special lift-out, featuring ten of the most interesting trends to emerge in news consumption and attitudes, including the growth of distrust in news, the divergence of news interest between young men and women, and changing use of social media.

As debate continues locally and internationally about the role of social media platforms and how to regulate them, more Australians are using social media to access news. One quarter now rely on it as their main source of news, with young people and women using it the most.

In a positive light, due to these uncertainties, more Australians have been turning to news and consuming more of it. Despite financial pressures, the proportion of Australians paying for news remains steady (21%) and higher than the global average. The data confirms that quality journalism and transparency are the most important trust factors, and these influence people’s willingness to pay for high quality journalism.

Other key findings

• This year, over half of Australians (51%) accessed news more than once a day, which is a 3 percentage point increase from last year.
• In response to major events in 2023, such as ongoing military conflicts in Ukraine and Gaza, the Voice Referendum and flooding in New South Wales and Queensland, there has been a sharp increase in the number of Australians expressing ‘news fatigue’.
• There are widening gaps between men and women, young and old, low and highly educated, and city and regional audiences in relation to news consumption, news interest, trust, and news avoidance. This reflects the dissatisfaction among sections of the audience that their news interests are not being met.
• Mainstream news brands and journalists continue to be the most popular source of news for people on social media.
• Transparency was revealed as one of the major factors of trust in news. The public often feels in the dark about how news organisations produce their news.