The NRS reported an increase of 13% year-on-year (YoY) for Associated Newspapers' Metro with readership rising to 3.69 million between January and June.
News International's Thelondonpaper saw an identical percentage increase in readership taking it to 1.1 million despite its recent announcement of plans to cease printing on September 16.
Three of the Sunday newspapers suffered a drop in readership over the first six months of the year. The Independent on Sunday was the worst hit with a 20% fall YoY to 606,000.
Scottish & Universal Newspapers The Sunday Mail saw its readership drop by 14% YoY to 1.2 million and Trinity Mirror Group's The People dropped 13% YoY to 1.4 million. The News of the World, owned by News International, remained the most popular with a 1% increase to 7.7 million readers.
In the magazine sector, monthly publications saw the biggest growth YoY over the first six months of the year. Bauer Media's consumer titles saw big gains with Empire averaging at 870,000 readers, representing an increase of 31%. Its music title, Q magazine, saw a 35% increase YoY to 674,000.
Men's weekly lifestyle titles felt the pinch with both IPC Meida's Nuts and Bauer Media's Zoo seeing significant six-month declines. Nuts lost on average 233,000 readers, which equates to 21% of its readership and Zoo was down 623,000, an 18% drop YoY.
There were declines in readership across the women's weekly titles. Hello! was the worst hit, down 18% YoY to 1.6 million. Two Bauer owned titles, Heat and Closer, overtook the title in readership.
National Magazine Company's Cosmopolitan is still the most read in the Women's lifestyle market. It saw a rise of 10% YoY to 1.7 million. Another of the publisher's titles, Prima, saw the biggest increase in the category with a jump of 21% YoY, resulting in an average readership of 696,000.
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