Guardian.co.uk stumbles in May

The Guardian's website has lost ground on market-leading MailOnline, after traffic to guardian.co.uk dropped 12.16% between April and May to a 2012-low of 3,405,011 average daily browsers.

The Guardian: suffers traffic drop
The Guardian: suffers traffic drop

May's Audit Bureau of Circulations (ABC) data reveals a mixed performance for national newspaper websites, despite plenty of online editorial coverage in the run-up to the Queen's Diamond Jubilee and the Euro 2012 Football Championship.

Total monthly browser figures visiting guardian.co.uk, the second most-popular national newspaper website, were 60,847,400 for the month.

The Guardian only publishes audited figures for total monthly browsers every other month, so there is no month-on-month comparison.

However, sources have suggested that monthly browser numbers were strong in April at guardian.co.uk, buoyed by the latest phone-hacking revelations.

MailOnline registered 5,610,664 average daily browsers in May, down 0.76% on April, but remains far and away the most popular newspaper website.

Total monthly browser figures were 91,687,074.

Across the rest of the market, Telegraph.co.uk, the third most-popular newspaper website, reported an average daily user figure of 2,532,022, up 8.06% on the previous month.

Some of the lesser lights, though, had a strong May. The London Evening Standard's website, Standard.co.uk reported a 35% surge in traffic to 150,400 average daily users.

Zach Leonard, managing director for digital at The Independent and London Evening Standard, said: "The record monthly traffic for May illustrates the sustained digital growth of The Independent and London Evening Standard across both web and especially mobile."

The Independent’s website, independent.co.uk, reported 713,000 average daily users, up 2.44% on the previous month.

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ABC Multiplatform report: May 2012
  May 2012 Daily change (%)
  Daily avg. Monthly total Mth/mth Yr/yr
MailOnline  5,610,664 91,687,074 -0.76 28.52
Metro  348,537 8,521,854 3.92 12.16
Standard.co.uk  150,400 3,356,950 35.97  
guardian.co.uk  3,405,011 60,847,400 -12.16 20.42
The Independent  713,000 15,450,335 2.44 5.61
Mirror Group Digital  765,044 15,953,205 15.80 8.23
The Sun  1,527,052 25,359,991 -0.24  
Telegraph  2,532,022 49,958,693 8.06 15.68

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