THE Irish News is officially the best performing regional daily newspaper in Ireland and the UK.
The latest independent ABC (Audit Bureau of Circulations) figures show that The Irish News outperformed every other title, recording an increase in both print and digital circulation in the first half of this year.
It was one of only two papers across Britain and Northern Ireland to post increases over both the previous six months and the corresponding period in 2016.
The Scotsman also reported a jump in combined print/digital circulation from January to June, but the figures were boosted by a significant number of discounted and free copies.
In the first half of 2017, The Irish News had an average daily circulation of 36,115 (35,463 print and 652 digital).
This represented an increase of 592 (or 1.7 per cent) on the previous six months and 194 (0.54 per cent) on same period last year.
Almost all of the papers (35,280) were 'actively purchased' at full price.
The Irish News was the only one of the three main Belfast morning dailies to report a combined increase in circulation, with sales of both the Belfast Telegraph and News Letter falling.
It also enjoyed a rise in its market share to almost 40 per cent.
The UK circulation figures have now been released, after a separate ABC report last week had shown the paper to be best performing title on the island of Ireland.
Editor Noel Doran said it is "hugely encouraging" to see an increase in circulation.
"Two ABC reports in the space of a week have now confirmed that our circulation performance, in terms of paid-for sales, ranks as the best in Ireland and the UK," he said.
"It is hugely encouraging that our audience is increasing both in print and digitally, and we are completely committed to maintaining the highest possible standards for our readers."
Irish News marketing manager John Brolly also thanked readers for their loyalty to the title.
"It is really refreshing that we were able to grow our print and digital newspaper subscribers on the back of strong campaigning editorial," he said.
"As we grow our readers across our print and digital platforms there is a strong sense of the value of the analysis and insight that we can bring to local news stories.
"We will start to move our columnists into a new premium section online and readers will need to subscribe to irishnews.com in order to read our news columnists towards the end of August.
"This is an important next step in our online strategy to allow us to continue to deliver quality opinion."
