The Pew Research Center has mounted a study of how U.S. adults use devices to consume news. The preferences and trendlines are definite: Digital devices on the ascendence, while legacy delivery platforms are in decline.
This research is about media categories and device categories. So, even though digital devices lead the way among devices, podcasting trails far behind other media types in news listening.
First, here are the device platforms:
That story is about frequency of use in a snapshot. Pew also has a four-year trendline, 2020-2023, showing the decisive growth of digital preference over television preference:
This research also drills into the composition of digital platforms, and their relative usage. There, we learn that website and apps form the most-used type of digital access to news. Search is nearly as popular, followed by social media. Podcasts are the least used type of digital service for news (among those offered to survey respondents).
There is also an interesting demographic breakdown, where we learn that men and women use digital devices to the same extent, but women like television more than men do. As in many other demographic surveys, we see that older Americans flock to television; the younger crowd leans into digital.
The fact sheet is HERE.
