How digital weighs up against print for UK magazine circulations

The Audit Bureau for Circulation (ABC) has released the first ever combined print and digital figures for UK consumer magazines in 2013, based on the average number of sales for a digital edition of each issue.

The IPC Media title What's On TV ranked highest with a combined total circulation of 1,051,129, of which 1,571 were digital editions. Slimming World Magazine placed second with a combined circulation of 458,517 with 7,739 digital editions, while Glamour magazine placed third with a combined total of just over 415,000, supported by 4,778 digital editions.

In a press release accompanying the announcement, managing director of IPC advertising, Charlie Meredith, said: "We continue to expand and look for new ways to engage with our audiences and ensure that our brands are everywhere our consumers need and want them to be."

In terms of purely digital editions, ABC confirmed tech title T3 as the most widely read consumer magazine in terms of UK digital editions in 2013, with a reported figure of 22,319 average digital editions sold per issue, a year-on-year increase of exactly 100 per cent.

In previous reports, ABC had recorded the separate interactive editions and PDF 'page-turner' editions of each T3 issue under different metrics. This is the first report in which the figures have been combined.

The continental Europe edition of the Economist recorded the second highest number of digital edition sales, with just over 17,000, an increase of 47 percent from December 2012.

The new figures mean the Economist has slipped from the top spot recorded in August 2013, the last time consumer magazine circulation figures were reported.

Stuff, the technology and gadget magazine from Haymarket Consumer Media, came third with average sales per issue of just under 15,000, a year-on-year increase of 194 per cent.



ABC still reported a significantly higher print circulation than digital for most audited titles, although a number of brands are starting to see the gap close.

Future Music magazine's average digital sales represented 44 per cent of its average circulation in 2013, just under 5,000 digital compared to 6,200 print editions.

T3's digital circulation is also closing in on print, as 42 per cent of sales came from digital in 2013, while US/Canadian digital sales of the New Scientist comprised 37 per cent of the reported average – 10,567 digital compared to 17,865 print.



Total Film, which placed just outside the top five, saw a dramatic increase in digital edition figures of 644 per cent year-on-year recording an average of just over 12,000 digital editions sold per issue.

Men's Health recorded the highest average digital edition sales for the report at the end of 2012, but saw a 18 per cent drop over 2013 to 10,340.

The two titles to see the biggest year-on-year increase were motoring magazines from Haymarket Consumer Media.

Classic & Sports Car, which had seen its average digital sales drop to just 50 at the end of 2012, saw a year-on-year increase of over 2,000 per cent to 1,213.

Autosport, which had previously reported an average of only 134 digital sales per issue, recorded an average of 2,150 for 2013, an increase of 1,500 per cent.

Additional reporting by Rachel Bartlett

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