Young people in the UK are significantly more likely to keep up with news using the internet, over TV and other sources, according to Ofcom’s annual news consumption report. In fact, nine in ten younger people aged 16-24 (89%) follow news stories online, compared with under two-thirds (61%) who get their news from TV. It is a similar picture among people from a minority ethnic background, with 85% favoring internet news over TV news (69%).
Generally speaking, however, use of TV news held steady during the last year and, despite these exceptions, it remains the most popular news source among the general UK adult population (79%). On the other hand, the data indicates that use of radio, print newspapers and the internet for news all declined year on year -falling by six, five and three percentage points respectively.
The research also found out that BBC One remains the most popular news source overall (62%). This was followed by ITV (46%) and Facebook (36%) although both saw declines in use for news since 2020 (from 49% and 40%, respectively). Several other news sources also saw similar declines year on year: Channel 4 (26% to 24%), BBC Radio 2 (16% to 13%) and BBC Radio 1 (13% to 11%).
Half of adults use social media (49%) and other non-social media websites and apps for news (49%). Younger people aged 16-24 are much more likely to consider social media platforms as their most important sources of news (36% compared with 14% for the average UK population). However, in general, social media performs least well on measures such as importance, trustworthiness, range of opinions and impartiality.
The study, entitled “News Consumption in the UK 2020/21,” looks at how adults and older children (aged 12-15) in the UK consume news across television, radio, print, social media, podcasts, other internet sources and magazines.