The newspaper market powered back into life in the New Year, with the tabloids energised by price cuts and promotions, and the quality market shrugging off price rises.
With every daily and Sunday title increasing circulation, the re-sized Observer eclipsed The Guardian's earlier relaunch with a 25.95% sales increase to 542,075 copies.
Guardian Newspapers will be doubly cheered by seeing The Guardian up 3.74% to 394,913, despite adding 10p to its cover price early in the month to take it to 70p.
The Independent also increased its price to 70p, a rise of 5p, and still sold 258,387 copies, up 3.27% on December.
The Times did better, up 3.58% to 685,081, while The Daily Telegraph achieved a more modest rise of 2.19% to 917,043 copies. The Financial Times lagged with a mere 0.52% increase to 441,840.
However, the real gains came at the other end of the market, with the red-tops' collective sales up 5% to 6.32m.
The Sun led, after a massive DVD giveaway, with a 6.4% surge to 3.319m copies, while the less freebie-happy Daily Mirror notched up 2.9% more copies at 1.728m.
Richard Desmond's bold price cuts from 40p to 30p helped the Daily Star to grow 5.2% to 820,070, and the mid-market Daily Express by 6.1% to 849,001.
The Daily Mail's millionaire competition helped it put on 3.37% to reach 2.389m.
In the quality Sunday market, The Independent on Sunday, which went compact in October, was The Observer's nearest rival. It put on a very healthy 10.21% to reach 241,414 copies, well above its figures during 2005.
The other recently made-over title, The Sunday Telegraph, put on 6.3% to reach 682,739 copies, but this is a way off its post-relaunch November high of 714,992.
Under pressure, but still up, The Sunday Times managed the smallest increase, up 3.34% to 1.357m.
In the mid-market the Sunday Express and The Mail on Sunday managed neck-and-neck increases of 8%. The former sold 877,101 and the latter 2.405m.
The Daily Star Sunday led the red-tops with a 14.87% rise to 439,067, but the News of the World put on more than 200,000 copies with its expose of England football coach Sven-Goran Eriksson achieving a 7.98% increase to 3.789m.
The Sunday Mirror trailed its rivals with a 4.01% rise to 1.574m, echoing its sister paper's comparatively subdued performance, and providing more food for thought for investors hoping for Trinity Mirror to sell off its nationals.
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