Nielsen March news sites: ABC audience up, BBC top 10

Latest data released by Nielsen revealed 13.5 million Australians went online for their news and current affairs information during March 2017 – up 2% when comparing both the same month the prior year, and the prior month.

Accessing content via a desktop remains the main method for access of this content – up 4%. However, growth in unique audiences when comparing March 2017 with February 2017 is also strong for smartphone (+3%) and tablet (+13%) devices.

Seven of the top 10 entities in the current event and global news sub-category increased unique audiences for March 2017 compared to the previous month, according to Nielsen Digital Ratings (Monthly) data.

• News.com.au is still in the number one position with a unique audience of over 5.7 million, an increase of 1% compared to the previous month.

• ABC News saw a significant increase in unique audiences and jumped to second place with 4.9 million (+19%).

• Nine.com.au is in third place with no change in its unique audience of 4.6 million from February.

• SMH.com.au is in fourth place with a unique audience of 4.1 million (-4%).

• Daily Mail Australia (3.2 million, +9%) and The Guardian (2.8 million, +6%) retained their fifth and sixth positions in the audience rankings.

• BBC jumped back into the top 10 at seventh position with a unique audience of 2.5 million (+14%), followed by the Herald Sun in eighth place (2.5 million, +12%), The Daily Telegraph in ninth (2.5 million, +6%) and Yahoo 7 News moving to tenth place (2.4 million, -4%).